Starfleet Command Volume II: Empires at War
Unofficial Strategy Guide and FAQ
by Kasey Chang
released July 1, 2002
0 Introduction
0.1 A WORD FROM THE AUTHOR
This is a FAQ, NOT a manual. You won't learn how to play the game
with this document, and I'm NOT about to add it to ease the life
of software pirates, no matter how old the game is.
Most of the tactical combat tips and discussions will also apply
to SFC1 and SFC2:Orion Pirates.
This version is NOT complete yet. I mainly play as the Federation
and Mirak (Kzinti) so those sections are done. As of this guide
I've also finished as the Klingons and Hydrans. When I find the
time to play other races those sections will be added.
Some of you may recognize my name as the editor for the XCOM and
XCOM2: TFTD FAQ's, among others.
If you don't care about all these verbiage (it's mainly for
people who want to redistribute the guide) you can jump right to
the end of this section and read some of the FAQs.
If you like the FAQ, send me $1.00. :-)
0.2 TERMS OF DISTRIBUTION
This document is copyrighted by Kuo-Sheng "Kasey" Chang (c) 2002,
all rights reserved excepted as noted above in the disclaimer
section.
This document is available FREE of charge subjected to the
following conditions:
1) This notice and author's name must accompany all copies of
this document: " Starfleet Command Volume II: Empires at War
Unofficial Strategy Guide and FAQ" is copyrighted (c) 2002 by
Kasey K.S. Chang, all rights reserved except as noted in the
disclaimer."
2) This document must NOT be modified in any form or manner
without prior permission of the author with the following
exception: if you wish to convert this document to a different
file format or archive format, with no change to the content,
then no permission is needed.
2a) In case you can't read, that means TXT only. No banners, no
HTML borders, no cutting up into multiple pages to get you more
banner hits, and esp. no adding your site name to the site list.
3) No charge other than "reasonable" compensation should charged
for its distribution. (Free is preferred) Sale of this
information is expressly prohibited. If you see any one selling
this guide, drop me a line.
4) If you used material from this, PLEASE ACKNOWLEDGE the source,
else it is plagiarism.
5) The author hereby grants all games-related web sites the right
to archive and link to this document to share among the game
fandom, provided that all above restrictions are followed.
Sidenote: The above conditions are known as a statutory contract.
If you meet them, then you are entitled to the rights I give you
in 5), i.e. archive and display this document on your website. If
you don't follow them, you did not meet the statutory contract
conditions, thus you have no right to display this document. If
you still do so, then you are infringing upon my copyright. This
section was added for any websites who don't seem to understand
this.
For the gamers: You are under NO obligation to send me ANY
compensation. However, I do ask for a VOLUNTARY contribution of
one (1) US Dollar if you live in the United States, and if you
believe this guide helped your game. If you choose to do so,
please make your US$1.00 check or $1.00 worth of stamps to "Kuo-
Sheng Chang", and send it to "2220 Turk Blvd. #6, San Francisco,
CA 94118 USA".
If you don't live in the US, please send me some local stamps. I
collect stamps too.
0.3 DISTRIBUTION
This USG should be available at Gamefaqs
(http://www.gamefaqs.com) and other major PC game websites (such
as gamesdomain.com, gamespot.com, etc.). I only release it to
Gamefaqs, so they would always have the latest. If you get it
from anywhere else, beware that it may NOT be the latest and
greatest version.
To webmasters who wish to archive this FAQ on their website,
please read the terms of distribution in section 0.2. It is quite
clear.
0.4 OTHER NOTES
There is no warranty for this unofficial strategy guide. After
all, it depends on YOU the player. All I can do is offer some
advice.
Some bits of information here are condensed, summarized and
adapted from the SFB Tactics Manual (original edition).
PLEASE let me know if there's a confusing or missing remark... If
you find a question about this game that is not covered in the
USG, e-mail it to me at the address specified later. I'll try to
answer it and include it in the next update.
The address below is spelled out phonetically so spammers can't
use spambots on it:
Kilo-Sierra-Charlie-Hotel-Alpha-November-Golf-Seven-Seven AT
Yankee-Alpha-Hotel-Oscar-Oscar DOT Charlie-Oscar-Mike
To decipher this, simply read the first letter off each word
except for the numbers and the punctuation. This is "military
phonetics" or "aeronautical phonetics" in case you're wondering.
This document was produced on Microsoft Word 97, with some
notetaking on a Handspring Visor with the Targus foldable
keyboard. Some editing done with Editpad (editpadclassic.com).
0.5 THE AUTHOR
I am just a game player who decided to write my own FAQs when the
ones I find don't cover what I want to see. Lots of people like
what I did, so I kept doing it.
Previously, I've written Unofficial Strategy Guides (USGs) for
XCOM, XCOM2:TFTD, Wing Commander, Wing Commander 2, Wing
Commander 3, Wing Commander 4, Privateer, Spycraft, 688(I)
Hunter/Killer. Mechwarrior 3, MW3 Expansion Pack, Mechwarrior 4,
Mechwarrior 4: Black Knight, Need for Speed: Porsche Unleashed,
The Sting!, Terranova, Fallout Tactics, and a few more.
Most of them should be on http://www.gamefaqs.com, the biggest
FAQ site around.
To contact me, see 0.4 above.
0.6 DISCLAIMER/ COPYRIGHT INFORMATION
Starfleet Command, Starfleet Command Volume II: Empires at War,
Starfleet Command Volume II: Orion Pirates are trademarks of
Interplay and its strategy division, "14 Degrees East"
respectively.
Starfleet Command Volume II: Empires at War was created by
Taldren. http://www.taldren.com
Star Fleet Battles is a registered trademark of Amarillo Design
Bureau. Starfleet Command is partially based on Star Fleet
Battles. See http://www.starfleetgames.com for more details.
Starfleet Command and Star Fleet Battles are both based
on/inspired by Star Trek, which is a trademark by Paramount
Pictures. See http://gaming.startrek.com for all you want to know
on Star Trek computer and console games.
Some material in this guide is taken from the master ship list
and master fighter list included with the game.
This guide was written withOUT having read the official strategy
guide published by BradyGames. That is a good reference to have,
if a bit pricey.
0.7 REVISION HISTORY
01-JUN-2002 Initial Release, only has Fed and Mirak
information, no info on the special missions.
About 50 pages.
12-JUN-2002 Second release, mistakes fixed (like calling
Dynaverse "Metaverse", blame my spellchecker!)
major reorganization into 3 parts (tactics,
Dynaverse, and ships), added Klingons discussion,
more detailed maneuver tips, more info on special
missions, some Dynaverse play tips. Double in
size, about 100 page.
01-JUL-2002 Added Hydran and ISC discussions, fighter tactics,
fleet tactics, cloak tactics, drone tactics, and
more. Added LOTS of notes from ISC campaign. All
ship info is now included. Also included Mirak
mission info provided by 3dot14. Right now it's at
about 165 pages.
0.8 THE MOST FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Q: Can you send me SFC2 (or portions thereof)?
A: No.
Q: Can you send me the install code?
A: That's a portion of the game.
Q: Can you send me the manual (or portions thereof)?
A: That's a portion of the game too.
Q: Can you tell me how to play the game?
A: Read the manual.
Q: What are the keyboard shortcuts?
A: Read the manual or look in the game options
Q: Which race should I start first?
A: Probably the Feds. They are "average" in all areas and their
ships are a bit more survivable. Another good start is Mirak.
Q: What is the maximum number of ships I can own?
A: Three ships. You may temporarily command more if you capture
enemy ship(s) during the battle. Those ships go away at the end
of the battle.
Q: What's the latest version of SFC2?
A: 2.0.1.3, released December 2001. You can find patches at
http://www.khoromag.com. They have taken over "maintenance" of
SFC2 from Taldren (for the most part). Other patches are "coming
soon".
Q: How do I beat those special missions in single player
Dynaverse?
A: See section 15
Q: Where are the cheat codes?
A: There aren't any. This is a STRATEGY game.
Q: What are some of the terms used in SFC/SFB mean?
A: See the "glossary" at 1.8
Q: I'm an SFB veteran. Why can't I make sense of SFC?
A: SFC is based on SFB, but it's NOT a direct computer
adaptation. It has its own quirks and tactics, though a lot of
the basic tactics such as Mizia, anchor, and so on still applies.
Q: But aspect ___________ of SFC does not fit rule ___________ of
SFB...
A: Being "based on" does NOT mean it's a direct translation.
Q: Where are the X-ships?
A: They are in the Orions Pirates "standalone expansion".
1 Game Information: What is SFC?
SFC, or Starfleet Command, is a starship combat simulation set in
the Star Trek universe. It is an officially licensed Star Trek
product.
SFC2 is the sequel to SFC, with a more extensive "campaign
generator" called Dynaverse II where you can actually affect the
outcome of the war by winning sectors, building bases, and so on.
1.1 BEFORE SFC, THERE WAS SFB
Star Fleet Battles was a board game that was inspired by Star
Trek. Amarillo Design Bureau (ADB) based Star Fleet Battles (SFB)
on the Franz Joseph "Star Fleet Technical Manual" (to Trekkers,
the TOS Tech Manual) where ships such as destroyers and
dreadnoughts were proposed as part of Federation Star Fleet. SFB
was VERY careful not to ever mention Star Trek or use ANY of the
Star Trek elements in its materials, as Paramount never licensed
SFB.
The original SFB was published in a small "booklet" format sealed
in ziplock bags. It was first published in 1979 though it was
designed as far back as 1975. It only had the Feds, Klingons,
and Romulans. Some races were added later.
Then came the "Commander's Edition" in 1990. Commander's Edition
had Federation, Klingon, Tholians, Romulans, Orions, Gorns, and
Kzintis (from the animated Star Trek episode, "The Slaver
Weapon", which used the Kzintis from Larry Niven's stories). You
can find more about the Kzintis by reading the "Man-Kzin Wars"
collection in your local library or bookstore.
The final (often called "Doomsday") "Captain's edition" rules
was in 1994. All the rules are now revised properly and swore
never to be changed except for VERY good reasons. Other races
such as Lyrans and Hydrans were added, and later the ISC. There
are also a lot of minor races like Lyran Democratic Republic
(LDR), the WYN, and so on in later expansion modules.
In time, the SFB universe diverged significantly from the Star
Trek universe. In SFB, the empires continue to fight minor wars
on and off until the General War, where everybody started
fighting. The Organians are missing, off dealing with some other
threats. The General war lasted 18 years. Organians later came
back with the ISC and tried to let ISC enforce peace on
everybody, and initially the ISC were successful, until a new
invader came, the Andromedans.
To learn more about the General War, please read the "General War
Timeline" on the SFB website at
http://www.starfleetgames.com/sfb/sfin/general_war.htm.
There was even a company or two that creates "unofficial
expansion" for SFB that adds new races in a different galaxy with
completely different combat rules. ADB themselves also published
several "alternate universe" products, including "Omega Sector"
(space beyond ISC) and "Stellar Shadows". They also published
some "minor races" (Lyran Democratic Republic, the WYN cluster,
the Jindarins, etc.) and the "simulator races" (what each
"empire" use as imaginary enemies in their training academies).
SFB also has a strategic component called "Federation and
Empire", which is a board game that simulates the General War
complete with strategic movement, supplies, shipbuilding, fleet
battle, bases, and more. You can even generate battles to be
fought with SFB. It has its own set of expansion modules which
adds rules to deal with marine action, carrier battles, detailed
combat resolution with new special devices, more races, and so
on.
SFB inspired a pen-and-paper role-playing game called "Prime
Directive", where you command "prime teams", basically special
agents that can handle ANYTHING for your empire. The game
features a "tiered" resolution system where it is possible to
completely BOTCH an operation. Otherwise it's a pretty standard
RPG in a sci-fi setting.
Later, Paramount granted ADB a conditional license that basically
says, "as long as you continue what you do now you are okay with
us." ADB has NO permission to use ANYTHING beyond what they do
now... To quote from ADB website, "We have Vulcans, but no one
named 'Spock'."
1.2 THEN COMES INTERPLAY
When Interplay obtained the license to make computer games based
on the "original Star Trek" license, one of the ideas thrown
around was to computerize Star Fleet Battles, and make it into an
official Star Trek product. Alan Emrich (noted strategy game
designer, contributor to Sid Meier's Civilization) claim to be
the first to submit the idea to Interplay.
The result is "Starfleet Command". It featured a full "career"
mode where the player creates a captain, gets a starship, goes on
missions, win prestige pts, then spends the points on better
crew, bigger ships, and so on. You can also join one of several
"elite" organizations within each "empire". As a Fed, you can
join "Starfleet Special Task Force". As a Romulan, you can join
the "Tal'Shiar", and so on. You will need to use your prestige
pts, but they will allow you access to even more lucrative
missions.
The Lyrans, Kzinti, and ISC never made it into SFC1 though. The
term 'Kzinti' was copyrighted (by Larry Niven's books) and
Interplay couldn't get a release without paying another license
fee. Tholians didn't make it in due to the complexity of their
"web" rules. Orion ships are in SFC, but you can't command one.
They are only there for you to fight against.
1.3 NOW THE SEQUEL
Starfleet Command Volume II features several new races: Mirak,
ISC, and Lyrans. It also features expanded ship list for all of
the races, plus a whole slew of neutral ships, planets, and so
on. Mirak were the SFB Kzintis.
Fighters and Fast Patrol ships (gunboats), and carriers/tenders
that carry them have been added as well. However, the individual
crew for each station (captain, science officer, tactical
officer, etc.) have been eliminated in favor of a vastly expanded
"campaign engine" dubbed "Dynaverse II".
The different races have campaigns set in the SFB "ISC
Pacification" period. Basically, the ISC jumped in near the end
of the General and shot at everybody, and was universally hated
as meddlers. They prompted the end of the General War.
Essentially the galactic powers, through separate efforts, pushed
back the ISC on all fronts, and you will discover the fate of the
Organians, and that threat they were talking about...
You can also play as the ISC and fight against everybody.
If you don't like the scripted campaigns, you can play a "pure
conquest" game by doing some unsupported modifications in your
game install directory. Look for two .BAT files in the game
directory and read the file before running it. It is NOT
supported, so don't blame anyone if that didn't work!
A stand-alone expansion pack: SFC2: Orion Pirates was later
released featuring advanced weapons and X-ships, Orion campaigns,
and final bug fixes. You can now finally play as one of the
pirates by joining one of the cartels. However, the individual
race campaigns have been eliminated. You can still play as one of
the galactic races, but you can only play "conquest". OP does NOT
require SFC2 to play and can be installed side-by-side with SFC2.
It has its own set of patches.
1.4 SO WHAT IS SFC2?
SFC2 has two parts: a campaign engine and a starship battle
simulator. In that way, it is similar to XCOM, with the
separation of GeoScape (world view) and BattleScape (tactical
combat view).
In the starship battle simulator, all of the systems on a
starship are at your command, from the sensors to the engine room
(power distribution), from the weapons to the transporters (to
beam out T-bombs or marines), from tractor beams to shuttles, and
more. The battle is on a 2D plane though the ships and other
units are fully 3D.
Surrounding the battle simulator is the campaign engine dubbed
"Dynaverse II", which can work both in single-player and
multiplayer modes. Dynaverse 2 tracks each and every hex on the
map, location of enemy planets and bases (which are visible on
the map), location of enemy and friendly ships (which may or may
not be visible), special terrain features (asteroids, nebula,
black hole, etc.). Then based on your movement, it will generate
missions for you. In single-player, some missions are "special"
missions and pre-scripted. Others are randomly generated. Some
missions will have a forfeit penalty.
As you win missions, you earn prestige points. You can then used
those points to buy supplies, repair and upgrade your ships,
purchase more ships, and so on, on the strategic map level.
Depending on how well you perform the missions, your empire can
win or lose control of a particular sector.
Each of the races has its custom campaign. Some have more than
one. If you prefer a raw "conquest" campaign, that can be
arranged by running some special setup .BAT files in the SFC2
directory. Look for it and read carefully what it does before you
run it.
In Multiplayer mode, SFC2 can be played in skirmish mode (fight a
single battle online), or on Dynaverse II server, where you can
contribute to your empire's war effort by winning battles.
1.5 WHAT IS SFC'S STARSHIP COMBAT LIKE?
SFC combat is VERY different from other types of combat, like
land combat and naval combat. Land combat speed is quite slow
with long range weapons. Same with naval combat. Weapons are very
powerful and protection is nearly nil. If you're hit, you're
toast.
A typical weapon in SFC has effective range of 8 (80,000
kilometers), while a ship can travel 200,000 kms or more during
that weapon recharge period (speed 20). Ships are all protected
by shields. It will take several salvoes to defeat the shields on
a ship and actually damage the ship. Firing arcs and maneuvers
are very important. Think of it as aerial dogfights between
helicopters and you wouldn't be far off... Except these
helicopters have energy shields...
1.6 WHO MAKES SFC2?
Talden created SFC2. It is published by Interplay's "strategy"
division, "14 Degrees East".
KhoroMag has taken over the ongoing support of SFC2. See
http://www.Khoromag.com
1.7 IS THERE GOING BE A SFC3?
Taldren has signed on to make SFC3 for Activision. SFC3 will
feature "Next Generation ships", including Galaxy, Sovereign,
Akira, and other classes. You'll be fighting the Borg, Romulans,
and more. It will be set AFTER Voyager returned home.
Supposedly, the plot is about a new super starbase the Feds built
in collaboration with the Klingons, and Romulans didn't like that
at all. Then the Borg somehow got involved...
The game will also be redesigned from the ground up, thus
removing the dependence on SFB inspired rules. For example,
shields will be reduced from 6 to 4 per ship. You will be able to
outfit your ship with specific enhancements, such as better
shields, weapons, and so on.
Supposedly this game will also make each race a lot more
dependent on that race's unique weapons. Feds will feature
phasers, Klingons will feature disruptors, and so on.
1.8 ORGANIZATION OF THIS GUIDE
This guide will organized in roughly THREE parts.
Part 1 is a discussion of the battle simulator in SFC2, and the
various "general" tactics that would applies to several races,
not just a specific race or weapon. Things like plasma tactics,
fleet tactics, fighter tactics and so on would be here, as will
maneuvers, HET usage, and so on. That would be from 2 to 11.
Part 2 is a discussion of the campaign engine, Dynaverse II, how
to play single-player and multi-player campaign, how to pick the
best missions, and so on. The specific mission walkthrus for the
special missions would also be here. That includes sections from
12 to 16
Part 3 is a race specific discussion on the ships, tactics, and
so on, for each race, a list of their ships, which ships are
good, and so on. That includes sections from 17 to 30.
1.9 HOW TO USE THIS GUIDE
This guide was not designed to be general reference, but it sort
of ended up that way.
You may want to read over EVERY section in this guide, as we
discuss tactics, systems, ships, races, special equipment,
weapons, and so on. This guide covers EVERYTHING. Read the
sections that apply to you first. For example, if you are playing
the Feds, read the Fed tactics, ships, read the section on
photons, drone defense, then read about the general tactics, the
discussion about your enemies. Eventually you'll read the whole
thing.
I don't cover stuff that's already in the manual. If you can't
figure out which buttons are which, you need the manual, not this
guide.
1.10 SOME SFC/SFB TERMINOLOGIES
Alpha strike -- fire EVERY weapon that is currently in arc at the
designated target. Also see "peak output"
Anchor -- see "Gorn Anchor".
Battle pass -- move past the target, allowing your rear/side
weapons to shoot at the enemy's rear/side shields
Battle run -- approach the target, shoot, then turn away to
expose rear weapons.
Crunch Power -- see "peak output" below
Drones -- i.e. missiles, self-seeking weapons with anti-matter
warhead and small warp drives. They were called drones in SFB,
missiles in SFC. They come in various types, but in SFC there are
only 2: Type I, and Type IV (which are twice as big as Type I).
Each comes in 3 separate speeds: slow (16), medium (24), and fast
(32).
Drone control limit -- a ship can only control a certain number
of drones. If you launch more than that, the first ones were
"lost" due to the limit. Most ships can control 6 drones. The
special drone ships can control 12 ("double drone control"). Some
very large ships can have "triple drone control" (18 drones).
Drone reloads -- each ship that has drone launchers need to
determine how many reloads to carry. By default, they carry only
one set of reloads. For example, if your launcher carries 6, you
have 6 more in storage, and that's it. It is best to upgrade to 4
set of reloads ASAP.
Erratic Maneuvers (EM) -- sudden random movements, makes your
ship harder to hit but move a bit slower and makes your weapons
less accurate as well.
EW / ECM / ECCM -- EW is electronic warfare, which is comprised
of ECM (electronic counter-measures, better known as "jamming")
and ECCM (electronic counter-countermeasure, known as counter-
jamming).
Gorn Anchor -- holding the enemy ship with a tractor beam. This
prevents the enemy from launching a wild weasel (sensor decoy),
thus impossible for seeking weapons, such as plasma, to miss
Hit-and-Run Raid (H&R) -- raid on specific enemy systems
conducted by your marines/boarding parties. If they succeed, the
system they attack is destroyed.
Internals -- short for "internal damage", amount of damage that
penetrated the shields. Example: "That salvo caused some
internals."
Klingon Saber Dance -- a maneuver started by Klingons. Basically,
it maneuvers staying just out of overload range to "wear down"
the opponent, who lacks the speed to get into overload range.
Mizia Concept -- introduced by Walter Mizia, it is an SFB concept
that a multiple smaller volleys is preferred to a single large
volley of damage. Statistically, in SFB, single large volley tend
to kill power but leave weapons, while smaller volleys kill
weapons but leave power. SFC has inherited same damage allocation
routine and thus the same analysis applies. Thus, the "multiple
small volley attack" is also known as "Mizia Attack".
Overrun -- pass right OVER the enemy ship, thus giving you the
opportunity to do point-blank shots, rear weapon shots, mines,
H&R raids, and so on.
Peak output -- better known as "crunch power", the theoretical
maximum damage that can be done in one alpha strike from a ship
in a single salvo. A Federation ship, for example, would have
higher peak output due to photon torpedoes doing twice the damage
as the disruptors. Seeking weapon shooters have even higher peak
output. Usually used like "a Federation ship has higher crunch
power than a Klingon ship."
Power Curve -- a measure of how much power a ship has vs. how
much power it needs to arm all weapons at regular and/or overload
levels. The "higher" the power curve, the faster you can go while
arming all weapons. Ships with fast-firing low-damage weapons
have a "flat" curve, while plasma-torpedo ships have a pretty
uneven power curve.
Scatter-pack -- a shuttle packed full of missiles (just 6) so you
can get a lot of missiles in flight all at once instead of
relying on the launcher to pump them out one at a time. There is
a delay between scatter-pack launch and the scatter-pack "pop",
so you have to protect it or drop it just before the enemy is in
weapons range.
Sensor Decoy -- see Wild Weasel
Shock -- when internal damage is received, one or more systems
may be 'shocked' into being temporarily disabled. A "shocked"
system will come back online after a period of time without being
repaired, but in the meanwhile you have to do without the system.
Sicilian Knife Fight -- a low-speed short-range battle with a lot
of overloaded weapons and reinforced shields.
T-Bomb -- short for transporter bomb, a small mine you can place
via transporter in the path of the enemy. You need to drop a
shield to transport a mine. You can also "drop mine" out of the
rear hatch of the shuttle bay. That does not require dropping a
shield.
Tractor beam -- a force beam that can push or pull other objects
as needed.
Underrun -- overrun done by a cloaked unit
Wild Weasel -- i.e. sensor decoy, a shuttle packed with
electronic gear that simulates your ship. It can deceive seeking
weapons such as drones and plasma torpedoes. However, it can be
"voided" if you go too fast, fired weapons, or so on. If you
launched a weasel and then voided it, the seeking weapons turn
back and come after you again. Weasel also generates 3 pts of
ECM, which can help you dodge things.
1.11 RANGE TERMS
Point-blank -- range zero or one, hit probability is 100%... You
can't miss.
Knife-fighting range -- range two or so, very slow maneuvering
battles
Drone-defense range -- roughly range two or three, where your
ADD/AMD and point-defense phasers/tractors works best
Overload range -- range 8 or less, where overloads can be used
Medium range -- range 8 to roughly range 15-20, reduced
probability of hit
Long range -- starts from end of medium to about range 30, or the
maximum range of the weapon.
Extreme range -- starts from when sensor contact is possible
(about 100) to long range.
2 Power, and what it affects
Before we explain the tactics, weapons, etc., we need to explain
HOW the ships actually produce the energy and move around, and
where all the energy would go.
2.1 POWER SOURCES
A ship has several sources of power: the warp engines, the
impulse engines, the auxiliary power reactors, and the auxiliary
warp reactors. Some ships also have "batteries" which can store
energy for later use, giving you a short-burst of extra power.
You don't really need to know all this though. Just remember that
a ship needs a LOT of power to move at "full speed", which is
"31". In fact, few ships would have much power in surplus while
moving at speed 31.
A typical cruiser has 34-40 pts of power.
The power is used in movement, EW, weapons, shields, and other
ship systems. There is never enough, so consider how are you
going to use it.
2.2 MOVEMENT COST
A ship has "mass", and power must be applied to move it. The
"movement cost" is a ratio of how much power does a ship need to
move at a certain speed.
A typical cruiser has movement cost of 1. To move at speed 30, a
cruiser would need 30 pts of power. Smaller ships have lower
movement costs; larger ships have higher movement costs.
Here's the movement cost list:
FF (frigate) -- 0.33
DD (destroyer) -- 0.5
CL (light cruiser) -- 0.66 or 0.75
CA (cruiser) -- 1
DN (dreadnought) -- 1.5
BB (battleship) -- 2.0
Special movements like HET and Erratic Maneuvers (EM) use some
movement energy. You can have full energy applied to movement and
still not get full speed if you are using either an HET or EM.
HET and EM are explained in 3.1.
As mentioned before, a typical cruiser has 34-40 pts of power. 31
of that are needed to move the ship at top speed, which leaves
very few left for the rest. If you need power to arm weapons,
tractors, shields, and so on, you need to take it away from
speed.
Gives a totally new meaning to "speed is life", doesn't it?
2.3 ELECTRONIC WARFARE (EW)
One of the places you can use power is electronic warfare, namely
ECM and ECCM. They are technically more efficient than
reinforcing shields in some circumstances.
Maximum power you can use in EW is 6 pts of power. At medium
ranges, they can be more efficient in reducing damage than shield
reinforcement.
EW is explained more in 4.2
2.4 WEAPONS
There are basically three classes of weapons: phasers, direct-
fire heavy weapon, and seeking heavy weapon.
Phasers are simple enough to charge with energy... Each Ph-1
takes 1 pt, Ph-2 takes 1 pt, Ph-3 takes 0.5 pt, and Ph-G takes 1
pt.
Heavy weapons can be normal load or overload. Overload cost
double the power but produced a more powerful shot with limited
range. Some weapons can have other special modes. Please see
individual weapon explanations in 5 for full discussions.
Once loaded, the weapon needs to pay a "hold" energy charge per
weapon until fired. When you shoot, then the weapons are charged
again.
Seeking heavy weapon need charging also, (except drones) with a
longer charging period in general. Once charged, seeking weapon
also pay a "hold" cost.
2.5 SHIELDS
Shields need 2 pts to power up to full strength. If you have
excess power, you can use that to reinforce one or more of the
shields against attacks.
Shield damage during battle is repaired automatically, but that
takes time.
2.6 OTHER SHIP SYSTEMS
A ton of other systems can use power, such as electronic warfare,
tractor beams, transporters, suicide shuttles, and so on.
2.7 LEARN YOUR POWER CURVE
There are many demands for power, but the source is limited. The
proper management of your available power is the key to success
in SFC2.
Learn your power curve, which refers to how fast can your ship
move after all the "housekeeping" is done (raise shields, and
such) and arm all weapons, and perhaps overload.
As an experiment, take a Fed CA. Go to Red Alert and try to set
maximum speed, regular photons. How fast CAN you go? Now change
to OVERLOAD. How fast can you go? Try the same with a Klingon D-
7. See the difference?
3 Ship Controls
This will serve as a quick review of all the systems in SFC2.
You should run through all the tutorial missions AND read through
the manual before you start reading this section. This is an
overview, not a full explanation.
A good captain uses ALL tools at his/her disposal. Those captains
that can use ALL of his/her tools most efficiently will defeat
the captains that do NOT use tools as efficiently or only use
some of the tools.
I'll go down the list of the commands given in the "officer
strip".
3.1 HELM
This is a quick overview of all the helm commands and what is it
used for.
3.1.1 Emergency Deceleration
Or in plain terms, "emergency brakes". It is usually shortened to
EmerDecel.
EmerDecel immediately slams your ship to speed 0 (well, it takes
a second). It will be at least 10 seconds (at default speed 7)
before you can move again.
EmerDecel also has the effect of increasing your forward shields
by a few points, depending on your speed before you come to be a
full stop. The higher your speed was, the most shield bonus you
get.
EmerDecel have several tactical uses. In general it is to stop
approaching something. For example, if you suddenly realized
you're heading directly at a planet and you're moving too fast to
turn away, you can do EmerDecel, which would give you a chance to
turn away.
If you combine EmerDecel with a tractor beam, you can slow down
an enemy ship so other ships (or missiles, or torpedoes) can
catch up to it. Slap the tractor beam on the enemy, then hit
emergency stop. The other ship will then "drag" you along, thus
slowing it down (how much depends on your size and his size).
EmerDecel, combined with a wild weasel (sensor decoy), becomes a
defensive maneuver against seeking weapons. As wild weasel cannot
be launched at speeds greater than 4, the quickest way to slow
down is with EmerDecel.
3.1.2 Erratic Maneuvers
Erratic maneuvers, usually shortened to EM, is basically small
random changes in course that makes you harder to hit.
EM reduces your overall speed, but generates several pts of ECM
in addition to what you can produce internally. However, it also
makes your weapons less accurate as well. So you will need to
stop EM before you attack.
EM is basically a defensive maneuver. Smaller units or slower
units can use it to avoid taking hits at long-range, then unleash
weapons when the range is closer and they can be sure of doing
some damage before being destroyed.
Races that use plasma torpedoes can use EM to help them avoid
enemy counter-fire when they have fired off their torpedoes and
are in the process of recharging. Or you can turn on EM to
confuse the enemy, to make them think you're recharging when you
really are not.
3.1.3 High-Energy Turn
Better known as HET, this allows your ship to ignore the "turn
mode" for a split second and make a turn in any direction. Thus
it is sometimes called a "snap turn". It is also sometimes called
"warp turn" as it basically generates a small warp field, thus
reducing the mass and allows the ship to freely rotate. On the
helm panel, some preset angles have been created for you (left,
right, hard left, hard right, 180) or use the free-angle control.
The problem with HET is you are NOT guaranteed to always succeed.
. You can see your "HET success chance" as a percentage on the
helm panel. In general, the smaller the ship, and slower you're
going, the better your chance of success.
If you failed in performing an HET, you'll suffer random damage
and you will temporarily lose control of your ship in the "HET
breakdown". The crew will pull themselves off the floor in a
while, but your ship is vulnerable in the meanwhile.
There is a delay of second seconds when you issue the command and
when the HET was actually performed. That was delay for the warp
field to "charge up". This makes timing the HET maneuver very
difficult.
HET can be used both offensively and defensively. Defensively, it
can be used to snap a new shield into place. Offensively, it can
be used to bring the weapons on the other side of the ship to
bear.
See maneuvers section 8 for more discussions on HET maneuvers.
3.1.4 Intercept / Orbit Target
Intercept basically means you're pointing the ship directly at
the target, right down the centerline. It is sometimes referred
to as "follow target".
Orbit target means you're pointing slightly off to the left of
the target. When you get close to the target you'll go into a
clockwise orbit around the target at speed 10. You can increase
speed though and the computer will do its best to orbit. However,
every time you select "orbit" you'll slow down to 10 again.
Giving any other helm order (like click on the map to indicate a
turn) will cancel any existing follow or orbit command.
While intercept is good to keep the enemy in your sights, it does
not do "lead" or "lag" pursuit (i.e. no aiming at where the enemy
would go or try to fall behind). It only does "pure" pursuit.
Orbit is pretty useless unless you're dealing with an extremely
slow or immobile target like planet, base, and so on. It also
slows you to speed 10. You can increase speed though.
Both can work on a "non-target". Just target the ship you wish to
follow or orbit, select the command, then target another ship.
Your ship will still follow the first ship while you can target
the second ship for more shots. If you want to follow other
friendlies into battle, target one of them for intercept, match
their speed, and you can start targeting enemy ships.
3.2 REPAIR
There are two things you can repair: engine power, and ship
systems. Each repair attempt uses one of your "spare parts". You
only have 8 maximum, provided you purchased extra ones. You start
with only 4.
Shields are repaired automatically as time goes by.
Engine power can and should be repaired if your ship's power
falls below the normal/undamaged levels. As for how much that is,
you should check your power graph (at the bottom of the screen)
when the scenario starts. If the number falls lower after damage,
engine repair should be done. If you still get "repair engine",
it's probably non-essential system like batteries and that can
wait.
Individual ship systems can be repaired as well. Usually, that
means weapons systems, though shuttle, transporter, tractor, and
sensors can also be hit.
Tractors and transporters are generally not worth repairing in
battle as you usually have several of those so losing one is not
a big deal. If you have only one, then you may want to think
about repairing it, and then only if you plan to use it later.
Drone launchers are probably not worth repairing, as the drones
are destroyed with the launcher. If you have reloads, then
repairs may be worth it. If you have virtually no reloads left,
spent your spare parts on something more productive.
Other heavy weapons should be repaired immediately, as they can
be put back to use immediately.
Phasers should be repaired ASAP as they have multiple uses.
Though if you have a lot of Ph-3's damaged you may want to hold
off on those and repair more important weapons first.
If you reach a friendly planet or base you can repair there as
well.
Hull integrity cannot be repaired in battle. It can only be
repaired at a friendly planet or base.
3.3 SCIENCE
Not too many commands here, except probe, deep scan, and self-
destruct.
3.3.1 Probe
The probes have two modes: normal, and weapon.
The probes don't do much damage if you arm them as weapons. Only
use in desperate situations.
If you fire them normally at a ship or planet or whatever, you
can pick up details about them earlier. This can be useful as you
can tell how they are armed, what class they are, and such info
long before they actually come into sensor range.
3.3.2 Deep Scan
Deep scan is needed to finish some missions. You may need to scan
enemy ships or planets.
You can "charge" the deep scan ahead of time then when you get
into range the target will be scanned. That is, if you don't
switch targets. If you switch targets you'll lose the deep scan
"charge".
Deep scan must be performed at less than range 10.
3.3.3 Self-Destruct
Self-destruct is obvious. There's a count down before the ship
actually goes up, so it's best to anticipate the enemy's final
approach, and make sure you don't blow up before then. Slap a
tractor beam on the enemy can be good as well.
3.4 SECURITY
There are two modes in security: hit-and-run, or capture.
3.4.1 Hit and Run raids
Hit-and-run raids (usually abbreviated H&R) are basically marine
boarding parties with demolition charges. They will try to damage
the enemy ship system you target. It is a one-way trip though for
them.
When you get close enough to the enemy ship (range 15 or less)
you can see detailed display of the enemy ship's systems. Click
on the systems you want to hit and they will be attacked in
sequence subject to available transporters and boarding parties.
To remove an item from the attack queue, click on it.
As a shield must be dropped to transport, you should immediately
start a turn to avoid the enemy pounding your down shield.
Remember that H&R raids are "automatic". You can't control when
will the shield be dropped. As soon as the enemy is in range, you
have available transporter and targets are in the queue, and you
have marines, your shield goes down and the raid is gone.
H&R raid is quite powerful and way too easy. It is devastating
against the AI and can turn the tide of a battle. The AI
controlled ships don't use H&R. Don't be surprised that some
human players request that BOTH of you do NOT use H&R raids
against each other during battle.
In general, it is better to target systems like phasers,
shuttles, tractors, etc. instead of heavy-weapons and such. Those
have more impact later in the scenario as most people tend to
repair heavy-weapons. Phasers are good choices also.
Monsters cannot be boarded.
3.4.2 Capture
In capture mode, you basically beam over a bunch of marines in
hopes of taking over the enemy ship.
To best accomplish this, you need multiple ships, all set to
"capture" order, and at "medium" autonomy so they all target the
same ship, and set to "trail" formation, with you in lead.
You beat down the enemy-facing shield, then beam over your
marines. Your other ships will also hit the enemy ship and beam
over their marines. You need two or three ships each with at
least 4 transporters to best capture enemy ships. You need to
beam over at least what the enemy ship has in "one pass" to be
able to hold the ship.
For example, let's say the enemy ship has 10 boarding parties
defending. You beam over 4 (that's all the transporters you
have). By the time your transporters cycle back, that 4 would be
down to 1, and they may or may not have caused even 1 casualty.
So now, you're left with 9 vs. 1. If you have like 20+ boarding
parties, you can eventually beam over enough, but you end up
wasting a lot of boarding parties if you beam them over piece-
meal. That's why you need multiple ships to do captures... A lot
transporters and marines to beam over.
While assault shuttles (see 3.5) can help get more marines over
at once (4-6? per shuttle), the shuttles are quite slow and can
be shot down. Using assault shuttles on armed targets moving at
speed is a waste of resources. They may work against planets.
Stop beaming over marines when you enjoy a 15-25% or higher
superiority (say, 8 to 6 in your favor). You can do that by
changing other ships' modes to "tractor" or "defend". Any
boarding parties you use must be replaced (which costs prestige
pts), and there's no reason to beam over more when you know
you'll win. You'll just win faster, and those extras you beamed
over must be replaced. .
Small units like shuttles and fighters, PFs, and so on cannot be
captured.
Monsters cannot be boarded.
Boarding may not work in Dynaverse against a ship controlled by a
real human player. Against AI ships it seem to work fine.
3.5 WEAPONS
The weapons panel is used to assign weapon groups, but you can
also assign weapon groups directly by using the ship system
display with hotkeys, so this panel is not that useful. This can
be good for quick adjustments of weapons groups though.
With 4 weapons groups to use, and a "choose all" ("red alert"
command), I suggest organizing your weapon groups this way:
1) Attack phaser group, 50-75% of your ph-1s or ph-2s, probably
frontal arcs. Used in attacks.
2) Defense phaser group, all your ph-3s or ph-Gs, maybe some of
your ph-1s with 360 arcs, mostly rear arcs. Used in point-
defense.
3) Heavy weapons group
4) Any auxiliary weapons (drones, etc.)
Assign the groups as YOU see fit. You can change group settings
here or use the hotkeys directly, so change them when you need
to.
You can also use weapons panel to switch between regular and non-
violent combat (i.e. minimize enemy casualties). However, no one
uses non-violent combat any way, so you can safely ignore that.
3.6 COMMUNICATIONS
This panel is virtually useless tactically except in special
missions.
Some special missions may allow you to control certain other
units by issuing commands here. You need to target the specific
ship and select the proper commands.
You may also be able to hail other ships from here in certain
special missions.
3.7 DEFENSE
You can use this panel to hit EmerDecel, turn on/off point-
defense mode, turn on/off point-defense tractors, and get status
of sensor decoy (wild weasel) shuttles (and launch if you got
any).
EmerDecel is discussed in the Helm section.
Point-defense allows the ship to automatically fire bearing
phaser(s) on approaching plasma torpedo or drones. In general,
you would want to leave point-defense on.
Defense tractors setting allows you to set the number of tractors
beams you got to point-defense (i.e. hold the drones from hitting
you.) Set defense tractors to 1 less than max, or max if you
don't plan to do anchors (6.3).
Wild weasels are discussed in (3.5).
3.8 TACTICAL MAP
In general, it's best to set lowest zoom (widest view), and zoom
in when needed. You can see the heading of the individual ships.
The contacts are also color-coded with each race a unique color.
3.9 FLEET CONTROL
See your manual for fleet control explanations, about the
different formations, "postures" (attack, capture, defend,
tractor), order intensity settings (loose, medium, tight), and
weapon control settings (off, regular, overload, special,
stealth).
In general, I set order intensity to medium to make sure all
ships are targeting the ship I want except in free-for-alls, and
weapon control is set to default.
3.10 ENERGY MANAGEMENT
Usually I don't adjust this. See your manual for explanations.
3.11 PREFERENCES
See your manual for preferences panel explanations.
4 Ship Systems
These systems are a part of the ship that can be used in various
ways that does not directly affect combat, but are important in
other ways.
4.1 SHIELDS
Shields protect your ship from being actually hit (duh!). There
are six of them, covering the "hex" around the ship. The "front"
shield is #1, go clockwise. So rear shield is #4.
You can raise shields in multiple stages: down, minimal, and up.
You can reinforce any or all of the shields with any excess
energy you got. Each pt you use in reinforcement on a specific
shield will cancel one pt of damage applied to that shield.
For example, let's say you have a 35 pt front shield. You have 2
pts of reinforcement. Enemy fires phaser and scores 8 pts of
damage. Actual damage to your front shield is 6, as 2 were
covered by the reinforcement. Your front shield is now at 29.
A facing shield will be automatically dropped for special
transporter activity such as T-Bomb, Hit-and-Run raids, beam-
in/out, and so on.
If you are in a nebula, your shields only operate at "minimal"
level.
4.2 SENSORS (ECM/ECCM)
You can jam enemy sensors by sending some power to ECM
(electronic countermeasures). You can counteract enemy jamming by
sending power to ECCM (electronic counter-countermeasures). This
together is known as EW (electronic warfare).
Maximum amount of power you can dedicate to EW is 6 pts total.
You can distribute this between ECM and ECCM as you see fit.
ECM creates a "defensive shift". The number is the "square" of
the power you put in. So if you put in 1 pt, defensive shift is
1. If you put in 4 pts, defensive shift is 2.
An active wild weasel (sensor decoy) produces ECM as well (until
it is destroyed).
ECCM creates "offensive shift" the same way.
Enemy can use ECCM to counter your ECM, just as you can use ECCM
to counter his ECM.
The "net" shift (defensive-offensive) is then used to calculate
reduced damage from weapon hits.
Some natural terrain like nebula and so on can produce natural
ECM or ECCM that affects everybody.
4.3 TRANSPORTERS
Transporters send things out or bring things in. Transporters
have short range (5.99) so you need to be very close.
Transporter bombs are small mines that you can "beam" out into
space, hopefully right into the path of enemy ships. (You can
also drop such bombs out the rear hatch, but that's a different
use altogether). See your command reference on how to designate T-
bomb targets. Also see 4.10 for more information on mines in
general.
In general, the AI ships under your control seem to be very good
at placing T-bombs. Usually they place it so the enemy ship runs
right over it with no chance to dodge, and they can do this
several bombs in a row.
Transporters can also be used to conduct hit-and-run raids. See
2.4.1
Transporters can also be used to capture enemy ships or bases or
planets. See 2.4.2.
In more peaceful uses, transporters can bring up certain items
from planets and ships, or even empty space. It can also send
certain items to planets and ships. In a lot of the special
scenarios, this is the only way you can solve the problem: get to
the place, beam up things, beam down things, and get away.
4.4 TRACTORS
Short for tractor beams, these are the force beam emitters that
can exert both push and pull forces.
Tractor beams have an even shorter range, at 2.49.
Tractor beam can be set to either pull or repel. Tractor beams
can be charged to six different force levels. The higher the
level, the longer it takes to "charge", but the more likely it'll
hold an enemy ship for a longer period (until he charges his own
tractor to repel, see below).
Tractor beams can keep annoying things from you (things like
drones) in point-defense mode.
Tractors can keep stuff close to you (like enemy ships) in "pull"
mode.
Tractors can also keep other ships from tractoring you when set
to "repel" mode. While in repel mode, the tractor will repel all
attempts to tractor up to the force strength it is set to. For
example, if you have your tractor set to repel at strength 3,
enemy tractors set to strength 2 will not be able to tractor you,
but enemy tractors set to strength 4 can.
One of the most satisfying ways to kill another ship is to
tractor it, then rotate it (using the tractor rotation buttons)
so you crash it into an asteroid or planet. However, DO NOT do
this to human-commanded ships while online. It is VERY annoying
and is considered VERY BAD MANNERS. Same goes for tractoring the
human-commanded ship and pushing him off the map.
Against AI, then "who cares".
Tractor beam do NOT work on shuttles.
4.5 SHUTTLES
Shuttle panel controls the shuttle bay. A ship can have several
shuttles in a shuttle bay. The normal "admin" shuttles can be
reconfigured as wild weasels (sensor decoy), assault shuttle,
scatter pack, or suicide shuttle. Or you can just launch it as is
and it'll shoot its ph-3 like a fighter while trying to follow
you around.
You can launch fighters the same way. The difference is the
entire squadron (2-6 fighters) is launched together as if it's a
single ship. Each squadron also behaves like a single ship (they
fly together and shoot together).
Most ships have only a limited amount of shuttles (1-5) and with
this many uses, you'll have to decide carefully how to use each
one.
4.5.1 Wild Weasel (Sensor Decoy)
Wild weasel is a decoy that attracts seeking weapons such as
drones and plasma torpedoes. It is created from a shuttle (must
be one of yours) and it only distracts seeking weapons that are
targeting you. It costs 1 pt of energy to hold per "turn".
A functioning weasel can be "voided" if you do any of the
following:
* Exceeding a speed of 4.
* Activating fire control (firing weapons).
* Operating transporters.
* Launching a probe.
* The launching ship exceeds range of 35 from the WW.
You can only launch a weasel from speed or 4 or less. If you are
moving faster and try to launch a wild weasel, you will
automatically EmerDecel (to speed 0).
You cannot launch a weasel if you are being tractored. (This is
the foundation of the "anchor" tactic, see 6.3)
In general, it is NOT a good idea to use a weasel unless you have
NO hope of survival otherwise. Using a weasel slows you down and
the enemy can do all sorts of things to you before you can shoot
again. After all, you don't know if that enemy torpedo coming at
you is a real one or a pseudo, and if you launch a weasel, you'll
never know. He may still have that torpedo charged and ready to
shoot...
4.5.2 Assault Shuttle
An assault shuttle carries a team of marines to board enemy ship.
However, assault shuttle is slow and vulnerable to enemy weapons.
It is not that useful.
Assault shuttle may be useful against undefended planets.
4.5.3 Scatter Pack
A scatter pack is basically a shuttle packed with multiple
missiles/drones on a delay-launch profile.
When launched, the shuttle points at the enemy and when the
sensor stabilizes, it dumps its payload into space. This
temporarily increases the launch rate of any drone-using ship at
the expense of a shuttle.
As a con, the scatter pack itself can be shot down if done early
enough. Then you've wasted all that time used to arm it, the
shuttle, AND the drones.
4.5.4 Suicide Shuttle
A very slow seeking weapon with a powerful punch, a suicide
shuttle is just that... a shuttle with autopilot and an
antimatter warhead onboard. It can only be used on VERY slow (or
nearly dead) enemies. It can be easily shot down by the puniest
of weapons.
In general, SS is not that useful. If you are out of other
weapons, SS may be considered as a last resort.
4.5.5 Regular (admin)
A regular admin shuttle can be launched and be kept nearby for
defense. You can give it orders just like a fighter, except it is
very slow and has just a single ph-3.
4.5.6 Fighters
While fighters in general refer to fighter-shuttles, in SFC2 it
can also refer to PFs (fast patrol ships, a.k.a. gunboats, a.k.a.
pseudo-fighters) and INTs (interceptors, basically a half-sized
PF).
A fighter squadron is launched like a single admin shuttle, but
it is actually multiple fighters. The squadron flies together and
shoots together. Each squadron a single "fighter" icon in the
shuttle bay.
There are actually 3 classes of fighters: light, medium, and
heavy, but that just affects their damage capacity (each) and
their weapons load.
PFs and INTs are gunboats. PFs are twice is large as INTs. PFs
are roughly half the size of a police corvette. They are carried
externally on "PF tenders", though some heavy ships carry PFs
externally as well. The PF tenders are considered carriers in
SFC2.
SFC2 TIP: If you kill the carrier, the fighters (and PFs) blow up
as well. So if you are fighting a small carrier like a FFV, DDV,
or CLV, blow up the carrier first so you don't have to deal with
the individual fighters and PFs.
5 Weapons
While these are the primary ways you do damage from a starship,
they are NOT the only way. (Don't forget the probe in weapon
mode, hit-and-run raid, and so on.)
In general, the weapons that can be overloaded cost 100% more
energy to load, cause 50% more damage, and have a max range of 8.
Knowing how a weapon affects your power curve can be very useful.
[Previously reported tip about FASTLOAD was a bug that has been
since fixed.]
5.1 PHASER
Phaser, the directed energy weapon, is the most popular weapon.
Everybody use phasers, including some monsters.
There are five types of phasers: ph-1, ph-2, ph-3, ph-4, and ph-G
(gatling).
Ph-1 is the most energy-efficient direct-fire weapon. It causes
the MOST damage per pt of energy allocated. Effective range is
about 5.
Ph-2 is considered the poor cousin of ph-1, as it has same energy
use, but less range and damage. Effective range is about 4.
Ph-3 is a defensive weapon only, with effective range of 1.
However, a pair of these (same power use as ph-1) do more damage
than ph-1 at point-blank range.
Ph-4's can only be mounted on a base, though some monsters may
have equivalent weapons. Effective range is 10-15, which is quite
far.
Only Hydrans and Federation use ph-Gs. Hydrans have it on every
ship while Feds have it on certain special escort ships. Ph-G
takes same energy as ph-1, but fires FOUR TIMES with beam
strength similar to ph-3. This means it delivers a lot more
damage in point-blank.
Phasers cannot be overloaded.
You should split your phasers in 2 groups and do NOT fire all
phasers at alpha strike. Keeping some unfired phasers is a very
good idea to deal with any emergencies, like a scatter-pack you
didn't notice, and so on.
Scan his ship (use a probe if necessary) and calculate how many
phasers should you reserve for point-defense. If they don't use
seeking weapons (Lyrans, for example), don't allocate any.
Your ship will automatically perform point-defense (like mini-
Aegis) so just leave the phasers (preferably 360 or rear arc) and
the computer will shoot them for you.
5.2 HELLBORE
Hellbore is a Hydran heavy weapon for long-range engagements.
Some monsters may use a similar weapon. Hellbore is a direct-fire
weapon that acts in an indirect way.
When a hellbore hits, it envelops all six shields of the target
and damages the weakest shield. If one of shields on the target
is down, the hellbore will cause "internals".
If hellbore's flight path intersects an ESG, it ALWAYS hits the
ESG.
Hellbore can be overloaded.
5.3 FUSION BEAM
Fusion beam is the "other" Hydran heavy weapon designed for close-
range combat. It is a "normal" direct-fire heavy weapon.
Fusion beam can be regular loaded, overloaded, or suicide
overloaded.
Overloaded fusion beam cause 50% more damage than regular and
cost twice the energy to load.
Suicide overloaded fusion beam cause 100% more damage than
regular, cost 3 times the energy to load, AND burns out the
firing weapon (it can be repaired, of course).
Fusion beam should ALWAYS be overloaded as it doesn't do that
much damage beyond overload range any way. Charge in, reinforce
forward shield, then blast the enemy to pieces.
Suicide overload should be used if you need to bring a QUICK end
to the battle. If you are at point-blank range, slow (i.e. plenty
of power), then by all means go for it.
5.4 ESG
Expanding Sphere Generator is a Lyran heavy weapon, which can be
used as ramming and drone defense.
Basically, it generates a "solid" forcefield around the
projecting ship at a variable radius. The smaller the radius, the
more powerful the field, but the less area it covers.
If the projecting ship can maneuver so the field hits another
ship, that ship's facing shields will be damaged. If you overlap
multiple fields, you can beat down the facing shield completely.
Then the rest of your weapons will find down shield to exploit.
The field is also murderous on fighters, PFs, shuttles, and
drones that come close to the ship.
However, the field has a very limited range. More maneuverable
units can avoid the field completely. The field also does not
affect energy-based weapons such as plasma torpedoes.
ESG cannot be overloaded.
ESG is very useful against cloaked ships, as ESG just "sweeps" a
section of space.
5.5 DISRUPTOR
Disruptor is a very standard direct-fire heavy weapon used by
Klingons, Lyrans, and Mirak. Some monsters also use disruptor
equivalents.
Disruptor takes half the time of photons to load, takes half the
energy overall, causes half the damage. It has low "crunch
power", so you'll need to fire more shots at the same shield to
do the same amount of damage, making it a "finesse" weapon.
Disruptors generally have better weapon arcs than other weapons.
Look at your ship carefully and note your firing arcs, and
exploit them.
Most disruptor-using races have secondary weapons. Klingons and
Miraks have drones, while Lyrans have ESG. Use them.
Disruptors generally have good range unless you're in one of
those small disruptor-armed units with those weak disruptor-1's.
If you can shoot enemy at long range, do so. By the time you
close range you've already recharged.
As overload disruptors still don't do much damage, you must be
careful on when to employ it. Consider using oblique pass to
reach JUST inside range 8 to shoot, then get out of range again.
If he withholds his shots, you won't be damaged. If he fires any
way, he'll hit a non-critical rear-side shield.
Maneuver with disruptors means looking one turn ahead. You want
to be in position to deliver your NEXT attack when your weapons
can fire again. This is more difficult than you think as the
longer-cycle-weapons give you more time to move away then move
back in. Look at his speed and plot accordingly. If you go too
fast, you'll cruise into overload range or out of arc. If you go
too slow, you gave up the initiative to the enemy ship and your
weapons will invariably be out of arc.
5.6 PHOTON TORPEDO
Photon torpedo is the probably best known heavy weapon of all.
It's a reddish blob that pulsates as it traverses the distance.
It takes twice the time to load than a disruptor, but causes
twice the damage. It also causes the SAME amount of damage at any
range (if it hits).
Photon does some of the highest damage among direct-fire weapons
at point-blank range.
Photons have 3 modes: regular, overload, and proximity.
Photon can be overloaded, which limits its max range to 8, but
doubles the damage.
Photon also has a proximity mode, which allows more hits at long
distances.
Photon is vulnerable to ECM, esp at long and medium ranges.
5.7 PPD
The Plasmatic Pulsar Device (PPD) is an ISC heavy weapon. It is
quite weird in that it is more like a "chain-fired" direct-fire
weapon.
When you charge it, and the enemy is in range, you get a
"wavelock" on the ship. When the wavelock has established, the
PPD will send "pulses" of plasma down wave lock. It takes a few
seconds to send all the pulses.
The PPD damages the facing shield and the 2 shields beside it.
You can overload the PPD, which makes it send more pulses. This
also has the range 8 limitation, so this can be very tricky to
get all 6 pulses off before you get into the myopic zone. One
possibility is to arrange a different ship to tractor the target
in the "deadweight" maneuver. Another is to slow or use
EmerDecel.
You can also underload the PPD, which makes it send LESS pulses
(with less power).
The PPD has several limitations. It has both a maximum range AND
a minimum range. Inside the minimum range, the PPD cannot
establish the wavelock. This zone is called the "myopic zone".
The PPD takes a while to load, and firing the pulses also takes
time.
(Keep in mind that ISC ships also carry plasma torpedoes.)
5.8 MISSILE/DRONE
Missiles, also known as drones, are seeking weapons with small
warp drives and anti-matter warhead. Many races operate drones,
including Feds, Klingons, Mirak, and more.
There are two types of drones in SFC2, Type I, and Type IV (which
is twice as large as a Type I and does twice the damage). You
cannot mix types on a ship. A ship must carry one or the other
type.
For example, let's say you have one drone launcher of capacity 6.
With one set in the magazine and four sets of reloads, that's 30
Type I drones. If you choose Type IV drones, you only get 15.
Each type of drone comes in 3 "speeds", slow (16), medium (24),
and fast (32). Slow drones are free. Medium cost some, fast cost
a LOT.
You can only have one speed of drones in your ship, no mixing and
matching allowed. When you have several launchers and a LOT of
missiles to upgrade, the cost of upgrading the speed can be
significant.
Drones cost no energy to launch, but are subject to reload
limits. If you're out, you're out. Each launcher can have one to
four sets of reloads, and those will cost money (except the slow
drones, which are free). You control the number of reloads in the
supplies menu.
There are several types of drone launchers. Some reload faster,
some have larger capacity, and so on. You can see the manual for
their explanations.
You can temporarily increase the launch rate by using a scatter-
pack.
Drones are subject to launching ship's control limit. Most ships
have single drone control, meaning it can control 6 drones. Some
ships can control 12 (double drone control) or 18 (triple drone
control). Those will be noted specifically on the ship list.
You can launch a drone at another drone. Target a seeking weapon
chasing you, then launch a single drone at it. You can use the
"target nearest seeking weapon" command to help you.
Drones don't always hit where you want them. It can also be
stopped by many different means
* phaser (in point-defense mode)
* tractor beam (in point-defense mode)
* anti-drone launchers (ADDs) (in point-defense mode)
* Transporter bombs (beam them or drop them)
* Wild weasel (takes care of ALL seeking weapons targeting
you)
* ECM (which can reduce the damage)
* ESG (absorbs all physical hits, including drones)
* Another drone (yes, you can launch a drone at another drone)
* Terrain features (planets, asteroids, dust field, etc.)
The tricks to use drones are mass, and timing.
Mass means create a swarm... Have so many drones launched they
saturate and overwhelm the target's defenses. However, having a
swarm means they are vulnerable to wild weasel (sensor decoy) and
T-bombs.
Timing means get all the drones to arrive almost simultaneously
so the target have the minimum amount of time to defend itself.
The best compromise is to launch them one at a time with a small
gap in between so they are NOT all vulnerable to the same T-bomb.
Can't do anything about sensor decoys, but more on that later.
For more drone and counter-drone tactics, see 11.3 and 11.4.
5.9 PLASMA TORPEDO
Plasma torpedoes are seeking weapons. It is basically a blob of
plasma enveloped in a force field inside a warp field. The
Romulans and Gorns are the primary plasma users, as well as ISC.
Feds operate some plasma-equipped ships as well.
The plasma torpedoes "dissipate" as it travels. They are very
powerful up-close, but become less powerful as they travel.
The plasma torpedo can also be further dissipated by phaser fire.
Plasma torpedo moves at speed 34, like "fast" drones.
The plasma torpedo comes in several sizes, from small to large:
F, G, S, and R. There's actually also a plasma-D, which is a "pre-
packaged" torpedo for the Romulan and Gorn fighters and defense
turrets. The ISC rear F-type torpedoes are called type-I.
The plasma torpedo takes a VERY long time to charge (3 times the
recharge period of a disruptor).
Plasma torpedo has three modes: regular, enveloping, shotgun.
Enveloping torpedo cost twice the energy, and produces a torpedo
that is twice as large, but this spreads itself evenly against
all six shields when it hits (at the slightly reduced strength).
When you "overload" a plasma torpedo, it goes into enveloping
mode.
Shotgun torpedo subdivides into multiple type-F torpedoes, each
of which must engage a different target randomly. Obviously, a
type-F cannot be fired as shotgun.
Each plasma torpedo launcher also has one to two pseudo-
torpedoes, which are torpedo decoys that looks JUST like a
torpedo when fired, but does not require charging and does no
damage. This primarily used to confuse the enemy as to your
torpedo charging cycle. Is that torpedo you fired a real torpedo,
or a fake?
You can "download" a plasma torpedo by charging a size that is
smaller than the launcher can hold. For example, if you have an S-
type launcher, you can charge G- or F- type torpedoes at a
reduced energy rate.
For more plasma and counter-plasma tactics, please see 11.1 and
11.2.
5.10 MINES
Mines are stationary explosive weapons you plant either via the
rear hatch or via transporter.
There are two sizes of mines: a T-bomb, and a NSM (nuclear space
mine). T-bomb does 10 pts damage, while NSM does 25 pts.
In SFC2, only Romulans carry a NSM, and that's "built-in". You
can't buy extras, nor can any one else.
You can drop a shield and beam out a T-bomb, which will activate
if you beam it far out enough.
If you drop the mine out the rear hatch, it will activate when
you get at least 1 unit away.
Mines just "stay" there for 5 minutes after being laid and blows
up near anything that comes by (drones, shuttles, ships, PFs...)
Mines are also good to rid yourself a bunch of drones chasing
you.
The AI uses mines pretty effectively, but you seem to need to
"take the lead". Sometimes they use it, at other times they
don't.
Drop mine just before overrun is a good start. Beam bombs into
enemy ship's path is also good idea but has greater risk.
T-bombs is a trade-off between risk (dropping one of your
shields) and profit (damage enemy AFTER all your weapons have
fired). If you can minimize the risk (i.e. you know dropping the
shield won't do you much damage as enemies have spent most of his
weapons) and maximize profit (i.e. do damage to the enemy) by all
means take it.
T-bombs are devastating against fighters. One nicely place t-bomb
will damage a whole group of fighters. On the other hand, most
fighters move a bit fast for T-bomb targeting.
You obviously need available transporters to use the T-bomb. If
you have a lot of H&R raids in the queue you may not have enough
transporters to use the t-bomb.
Best time to use the T-bomb is when you already HAVE a downed
shield, courtesy of the enemy. Do it right after the overload
exchange.
T-bombs are the foundation of the "flash-bulb" anti-cloak tactic
(see 11.8.1). Best part, the receiver can't do anything about it.
Use mines and T-bombs to encourage the enemy to turn a certain
way that is more advantageous to you. The enemy's instinct to
avoid the T-bomb may cause them to reveal a down shield to your
weapons.
Klingons LOVE T-bombs as they have plenty of transporters to use
them.
5.11 NOTE ON OVERLOADS
Overload is the ability to push a weapon to do more damage than
it's designed to do. The price you pay for 50% more damage is
100% more energy use, and range limit of 8. Some weapons also
have point-blank "feedback" damage.
Why overload? When you need to do MORE damage than what you
normally do. You always want to do as much damage to the enemy as
possible, subject to tactical situations. If you are going to
fire close any way, there's no reason why you would not want to
overload.
Overload's primary drawback is the limited range. If you cannot
get into overload weapon range, then the energy you used for
overload would have been for nothing. If you have to turn the
overload back into a normal load, that time spent recharging the
weapons will leave you without weapons except phasers.
The large power requirement for overload will severely reduce
your speed. Phasers, as noted before, are far more efficient. If
you are short on power to start with, you may want to stick with
regular loads.
While you CAN overload SOME weapons and not others, it's a poor
compromise.
6 Introduction to SFC2 tactics
Every action you do in SFC has a "price". It can be energy,
availability, and so on. The decision you need to make is how to
get the most benefit out of that price you pay.
The old adage "apply your strengths to his weaknesses" is the
heart of SFC2 tactics.
Or as American Civil War General Nathaniel Bedford Forest was
reputed to have said, "Get there fastest with the mostest."
(Which is a misquote, by the way.)
To do that, you need to know energy management, maneuver, and
timing.
We will also discuss the difference between passive vs.
aggressive play styles, and how to counter each type in general
terms.
6.1 THE PRICE VS. THE PAYBACK
Everything you do in SFC has a price.
If you fire a weapon, you can't use it until the weapon has been
charged again. If you don't fire, you won't do any damage.
If you overload the weapons, you may not have the speed to get
into overload range. If you don't, you may not penetrate the
enemy shields.
If you fire a drone or use a shuttle, it's taken out of your
inventory and thus is not available any more. If you don't use
them, you don't get their benefits.
Increasing speed decreases power available to other systems.
Decreasing speed gives up initiative to the enemy and may worsen
your "turn mode".
The trick is to make the MOST of them by knowing what are the
prices vs. the benefits, and use proper timing and circumstances
to get maximum effectiveness out of them.
The new players seem to fall into 2 camps... Either they are TOO
aggressive (they pay the price at the wrong time for little or no
payback), or waited TOO LONG for that "perfect shot" (waiting for
that big payback). The proper balance lies between those two
extremes.
6.2 ENERGY MANAGEMENT
A starship never has enough energy to run everything it needs. If
you want speed, you have to give up energy from elsewhere, such
as shields, weapons, and so on. There is SOME reserve power
available, but amount is small and it runs out quickly.
Fortunately, in SFC/SFC2 AI handles energy management and there
usually isn't much need for changing any thing. You just need to
remember your energy expenditure and how they affect your energy
allocation, and remember to change it when you need to.
Basically, energy management is having enough energy WHEN you
need it so you don't have to wait to do something else.
If you overload all heavy weapons, you HAVE to sacrifice speed.
However, will the lower speed allow you to enter overloaded
weapons range (8) at all? Can you afford to arm AND "hold" all
the heavy weapons while you chase the enemy ship down? Do you
have enough energy for tractor beams and transporters? Are you
moving fast enough so you can turn in time? If not, do you have
enough energy for an HET?
Knowing your power curve would help a lot here, as you need to
estimate your speed, the enemy speed, and plan your engagement
range and which weapons to arm and fire.
You have to make decisions on these and more during battle in
split seconds. Make the right ones and you'll likely succeed.
Make the wrong ones and you will likely fail.
6.3 MANEUVER
Two things affect maneuver: your turn rate, and your weapon arcs.
Your ship's size, speed, and design affect your turn rate. A Gorn
ship is relatively slow to turn while a Klingon or Lyran ship of
the same size would turn faster. The larger the ship is, the
slower it turns, so a frigate would outturn a dreadnought any
day. Finally, the faster you go, the slower you turn (and bigger
your turn radius). Yet when you go very slow, you also turn very
slow. Each ship has a "corner speed", where it turns the fastest.
Find it, and exploit it.
Your weapon arcs are very important when fighting, as you want to
put most of your firepower on the enemy while avoiding his
firepower. Most ships have most of their firepower concentrated
on their forward centerline (i.e. when it is facing you
directly). If you are off to one side (the 3 o'clock or 9 o'clock
positions) of the enemy the firepower facing you is vastly
reduced, as most heavy weapons are FA arc only. (For explanation
of the various firing arc terms, please see your SFC2 manual).
For example, let's say you are flying a Klingon ship that have FH
firing arcs for your disruptors instead of the regular FA arcs.
FA is only the front 60 degrees, while FH is the entire forward
hemisphere. So instead of having to point your nose more-or-less
at the enemy, you can put the enemy on your 3-9 line (off to a
side) and still hit the enemy with your heavy weapons. That makes
your maneuvering much easier. Therefore, your maneuvers will be
very different from a Federation ship that only has FA firing
arcs for the photon torpedoes.
Maneuvering in battle basically means you are trying to point
most of your weapons at his weakest shield while keeping YOUR
weakest shield away from most of his weapons. This can get tricky
when there are multiple enemies involved.
6.4 WEAPON ARCS
(Summarized and adapted from article by Felix Hack, originally
appeared in SFB Tactics Manual)
Maneuver and firing arcs are closely related. Maneuver is used to
get the weapons into range with the enemy in the arc. The arc
then dictates what maneuvers are needed and can be expected.
Most ships can be divided into two categories: forward-centerline
firepower, and FA arc firepower.
The ships with forward-centerline firepower must point the ship
directly at the enemy ship to bring maximum amount of firepower
to bear. For example, Gorn ships and Hydran ships with split
"left/right" arcs are forward-centerline ships as you need to fly
them center-line to enemy to get all heavy weapons to bear. I'll
abbreviate these as FC ships.
The FA firepower ships can deliver all the firepower roughly
through the entire FA arc. Most Fed, Klingon, Romulan, and ISC
ships are FA ships.
The FC ships need to face the enemy to get maximum firepower to
bear, so the best way to fight such ships is to go to the sides
or even to the rear. If you do that you instantly halved their
firepower. On the other hand, the FC ships can choose to fire
half of their weapons, then turn and fire the other half.
The FA ships can use the "oblique pass" (see 8.1.2), which gives
them more options to maneuver.
Plasma torpedo users often have pretty wide weapon arcs, and thus
should be exploited.
Remember that an HET can be used as a surprise to suddenly bypass
any maneuver and firing arc restrictions.
6.5 TIMING
Timing is basically tactical sense on knowing WHEN to do
something, not too early and not too late.
For example, if you make a turn too late, you may not hit the
enemy's downed shield with your phasers, or worse, exposed your
own downed shield to his weapons.
If you activate an ESG too late that weapon may not activate soon
enough to block the enemy missiles.
In general, you want your weapons pointed at the enemy when the
weapon is ready to fire, with no idle moments. Of course, this is
not always possible. You may be waiting for a down shield to come
around so you can do more damage. Just beware of all these
considerations.
This mainly comes from situation awareness and preparation. It
requires a bit of tactical finesse and experience, so keep
playing and keep learning.
6.6 PASSIVE VS. AGGRESIVE PLAY STYLE
To paint broad strokes, there are two types of play styles:
aggressive, and passive. Aggressive players come after you, while
passive players wait for you to go after them and will try to
keep their distance. A player can be both depending on their
"phase".
Most players are aggressive when they have their weapons charged
and "passive" when their weapons are charging.
Direct-weapon users tend to be aggressive, esp. those with close-
range weapons, like Hydrans (fusion beam) and Lyrans (ESG). They
have to as they need to get close to you.
Those with heavy weapons in FA arc need to be aggressive, as they
need to point the weapons at you to do damage. This is esp. true
for those forward-centerline firepower ships.
Ships with low crunch power tend to be passive, esp. fighting
high crunch power ships.
Drone-users tend to be passive, as they need time to build-up a
"swarm" of drones. Drones are 360 free-fire so they can be
launched as pursuers. Drone users prefer to be chased as they
hold the "positional advantage". They shoot drones "downstream"
while your seeking weapons have to travel "upstream". However,
some drone users, using plasma-style tactics, can be aggressive.
Plasma users can be both passive and aggressive. Gorn, with their
"anchor" tactic (see 8.3.1), can be aggressive in their charge,
but passive during their recharge cycle. It's same with Romulans.
To fight aggressive style players, you need to take out their
FRONT shields. This will force them to expose their down shields
in order to hit you.
To fight passive style players, you need to take out their REAR
shield. This will force them to turn their shield 3 or 5 (rear
side) shields toward you, thus allowing you to get closer.
6.7 "USE YOUR TRACTORS, DAMMIT!"
In SFB lore, this slogan was in a plague right above the door to
the starship combat simulator in the Federation Starfleet
Academy.
What it REALLY means is you should use ALL your ship's systems. A
captain who is aware of ALL his ship's capabilities and can use
them at the right time has advantage over the captain who is not.
For example, how many people use the probe at all? Yet using it
can mean the difference between knowing what you are fighting
ahead of time vs. when you get close enough to do H&R raids.
Tractors can be used to hold the ship AWAY from point-blank
range. Many weapons do the most damage at range 0, and a tractor
will ensure they stay at range 2.5. You can then rotate the
tractor to the rear and then release the enemy in your wake.
Tractors are also excellent drone defense, and foundation of the
"anchor" maneuver.
Transporters can be used to beam up or down items, transport
marines for raids or captures, even beam out t-bombs to damage
enemy ships.
Learn and use ALL of your ship's systems.
6.8 "SPEED IS LIFE"
This is actually the motto of the Israeli Air Force, but borrowed
for the SFB.
In order to power non-movement systems, you need to divert power
from the movement systems.
But if you do it too much, you can't maneuver.
Victory is a careful balancing act. Use your speed (or lack of)
for a purpose.
Again, knowing your power curve would be really useful here.
6.9 SITUATIONAL AWARENESS
Situational awareness basically means being aware of everything
around you. Someone with good situational awareness doesn't need
to take attention off the primary task to double-check.
While situational awareness is not as crucial in starship combat
(i.e. SFC2) as in more fast-paced games like space fighter combat
or aerial combat, it is still important. For example, it wouldn't
do for you to line up a perfect pass at the enemy's down shield
if your facing weapons haven't recharged yet, or trying to get
away from an enemy ship only to smack right into a planet.
The control panel indicators are there to help you. All the
indicators have a meaning, and it's up to you to learn them all.
The two ship displays have relative facing indicators, but that
only works on the ship being targeted. If you are fighting
multiple ships you may end up dodging one ship and exposing your
down shield to another. Or worse... fly right into a planet or
asteroid.
Having good situational awareness also helps in the other three
aspects of tactics: timing, maneuver, and energy management. You
would know when to time your burst of speed (based on your ship's
acceleration) to maneuver so your weapons are pointing at the
enemy's down shield with enough power to shoot.
6.10 MIZIA CONCEPT
Mizia Concept was very simple: instead of firing a single massive
volley of all weapons, beat down that shield, then fire several
smaller volleys.
Why is this better? Because multiple smaller hits damage more
weapons, whereas single overwhelming volley damages power and
hull.
What's better... There really is no "defense" against this
attack.
It is a bit difficult to execute, but quite useful.
Trivia: Mizia Concept was named after Walter Mizia, veteran SFB
player, who observed this trend in the damage allocation rules
and came up with a way to exploit them.
7 Combat Checklists and some more tips
7.1 BATTLE START CHECKLIST
Here's a list of items you should immediately perform upon
starting a mission
* Red Alert (which arms and selects all weapons)
* Check number of friendlies, note classes and numbers
* Arm scatter-pack and/or decoy shuttle depending on mission
* Set tactical zoom level to lowest/widest (so you can see
more of the space)
7.2 ENEMY DETECTED CHECKLIST
Here is a list of items you should immediately perform upon
detecting enemies on sensors
* Determine enemy numbers and type (use a probe if necessary)
* Determine which enemies friendlies (if any) appear to be
engaging
* Determine which enemy ship to engage first or to disengage
* Determine whether to capture or destroy the target if
engaging
* Determine initial tactic: overrun, oblique pass, etc?
* Determine shield reinforcement if needed (usually front
hemisphere shields)
* Determine battle speed (slow, fast, etc?)
* Determine hit-and-run targets if needed
* Determine ECM and ECCM settings if needed
* Charge tractor beam(s) for anchor if needed
* Set point-defense mode for phasers and tractors beams if
needed
7.3 CAPTURE CHECKLIST
Here is a list of items you should check before attempting to
capture an enemy unit
* Check all available marines on YOUR ships (AI friendly ships
do NOT assist in captures. They often RUIN your captures by
blowing up that ship with your marines onboard)
* Count total number of transporters available on YOUR ships
* Check enemy marines on target in the "capture" panel.
* Calculate approximate marines usage.
Marine usage is dependent on the number of transporters you have
available and how fast can you send over reinforcements.
The rule of thumb is
Usage = 1.5 * (enemy_marines ) * (enemy_marines /
your_transporters )
For example, if the enemy has 10 marines, you have only 5
transporters available, expect to use about 30 marines to capture
the enemy ship. (1.5 * 10 * 10 / 5) = 30
However, if the enemy has 10 marines, and you have 10
transporters available, then you can expect to use only 15
marines to capture the enemy ship. (1.5 * 10 * 1 = 15)
* If you have enough marines to do it, then continue.
Otherwise, destroy the enemy ship and don't bother.
* Confirm all your ships set to medium order intensity and
capture mode. Also set all ships to "inline" formation with you
in the lead. (This is to make sure they try to capture the same
ship instead of wandering the map with "no target" and they would
go through the same shield you do in a single "burst")
* Make your pass, use just enough weapons to beat down a
shield, and beam on your marines. Fire weapons in single shots.
As the other ships see the down shield they should beam their
marines also. Then repeat sending in marines if necessary.
7.4 CALCULATING YOUR ODDS
You can read enemy ship classes at distance of over 100 kk. You
should be able to figure out how far are you outmatched, if you
are at all.
Here's a rule of thumb to use
Use 9 for BB, 7 for DN, 5 for BCH, 4 for CA, 3 for CL, 2 for DD,
1 for FF. Zero for all else.
If the any are carriers or PF tenders, add 1 per carrier.
If the enemy uses plasma torpedoes or drones, add 1. (To account
for crunch power)
Total up the "force number" for both sides and compare the
number. That should give you a quick idea on how the two forces
match up.
If the ratio is within 10% of 1 to 1, you should be able to win
if you don't make any mistakes, and not lose any ships. However,
it's a very even fight and there wouldn't be much 'profit' in it.
If the ratio favors the enemy a bit, see if you can even up the
odds a little by using tricks like scatter-pack and anchor to
quickly kill one ship. Otherwise, stay back and kill the smaller
ship(s) that gets close first. You can think about disengaging
later.
If the ratio favors the enemy a lot, run away and pick something
easier.
If the ratio favors your side, blast them.
If the ratio REALLY favors your side, try going for captures to
enhance your prestige.
For example, say you have 2 BCH's against 1 enemy BB. The ratio
is 10 to 9 in your favor (roughly). You should win in the end,
but there's probably no "profit" in this battle. This will be a
tough fight. If you can find easier battles, do so.
7.5 LEARN THOSE KEYBOARD SHORTCUTS!
Almost EVERY command in SFC2 has a keyboard shortcut. You should
learn them by heart, or at least copy the quick reference card.
They allow you to give orders much faster than going through the
mouse-clicks alone.
7.6 PLAY AT A SLOWER GAME SPEED IF YOU WANT
If you play alone, you can go as low as game speed 1. However,
such a game would be really slow. Default speed of 7 is actually
quite fast. You may want to consider 4 or 5 first, then increase
speed when you understand the battle a bit more, then speed up or
slow down as needed.
7.7 A NOTE ON TERRAIN
There aren't that many terrains in SFC, just empty space,
asteroids, dust field, pulsar, black hole, and nebula (and some
planets).
Asteroids are navigational hazards. If you have a heavy ship and
have plenty of tractor power, consider pushing enemy ships into
asteroids.
Lyrans hate asteroids and dust fields as it wears down their
ESGs.
Dust fields forces you to slow down and apply reinforcement to
front shields, reducing available power.
Pulsar and black hole only rarely appear in a scenario, and never
in the regular ones.
Nebula makes everybody have equal shields, and seeking weapons
nearly useless. Still, if you fire them close enough some may
still survive long enough to hit. The reduced shield strengths
mean there will be a lot of internal damage scored. Smaller ships
may have the advantage here as they mount more weapons.
Minefield can be considered "artificial terrain", but that's a
separate topic altogether.
7.8 A QUOTE TO DWELL ON
"The only valid test is combat; the only valid result is victory"
-- Adm. Steven V. Cole, designer of Star Fleet Battles
In other words, no matter how fancy of a tactic we can explain to
you, it is up to you to put it into action. You can dream up
fancy tactics on paper, but until you test them in combat, you
would never know if they work or not.
Trivia: this quote was originally attributed to Ardak Kumerian, a
Klingon Admiral, who's S.V. Cole's alter ego in SFB.
8 Offensive Maneuvers
You need to know some of the common maneuvers that are
performed...
8.1 SIMPLE MANEUVERS
These maneuvers don't require any special devices or any specific
setup, and does not involve HETs.
8.1.1 Overrun
Overrun is simple: point the nose at the enemy, shoot at point-
blank, and fly right over the other ship.
Overrun is best done by ships with maximum point-blank firepower,
esp. those with forward centerline firepower. Hydrans are good
candidates.
To exploit the downed shield, overrun should be followed up by
several attacks, such as hit-and-run raids, drop mine, scatter-
pack, fighters, drones, or better... another ship.
You can combine overrun with anchor (see below) for a really
devastating blow.
The overrun is very simple but it usually results in your front-
shield being blown, and that can be bad.
In a cloak-able ship, you can approach until enemy is range, fire
weapons, then cloak as you fly over him. This is called an "under-
run".
The Hydrans specialize in the "fusion charge" with their fusion-
armed ships. Basically, they overload the fusion beams, then hold
the weapons, go maximum available speed, and charge right down
the middle with forward shields reinforced, erratic maneuvers,
max ECM. Enemy fire would be ineffective. Then at point blank,
stop the EM and deliver a devastating alpha strike at point-blank
range.
The Feds can do the same with a photon salvo at point-blank
range.
Plasma using races can do the same by firing plasma so close the
enemy has no chance to launch a weasel.
The "charge" doesn't work against people who know how to maneuver
and avoid the charge. Those who use "saber dance" maneuvers can
avoid the charge easily. The "charge" also usually causes severe
damage on the front shield, leaving you vulnerable to later
attacks.
Higher speed and maneuverability can counter overrun. Then it
turns into a battle pass or pursuit.
8.1.2 Oblique pass
Oblique pass is nearly as simple as overrun. Instead of point
directly at the enemy, you point slightly off to one side, so
when you are in weapons range of each other, you hit the right-
front or left-front shields instead of front shield. Then you can
decide if you want to turn away, or turn in to attack.
Ships with FA firepower are best candidates to use oblique pass.
They can deliver the same firepower throughout their FA arc.
This is sometimes called a "battle pass", and it can be quickly
converted to overrun or battle run, or even pursuit.
The oblique pass can quickly turn into an overrun if both sides
turn in to each other.
If one side turns in and the other side turns out, it becomes a
tail-chase situation. The chasee can launch drones, drop T-bombs,
etc. to attack, but cannot use primary weapons. The chaser has
primary weapons in arc but can't really use seeking weapons as
he's a positional disadvantage. If the Klingon turns in, this
maneuver is called "the Klingon Hook" as the superior
maneuverability of Klingon ships makes this easier.
If both sides turn out, it's time to disengage.
Oblique pass may not be good if your ship has firing arcs that
emphasize firepower to the sides. Oblique pass can halve your
firepower, though you can always maneuver after you fire half of
your weapons.
Beware of the HET following a battle pass or battle run.
8.1.3 Battle run
You approach the enemy pointing just off to one side of him.
After you fire at the range of your choice, you turn away to
expose your rear weapons at the same shields you had hit before.
If you have significant number of side or rear firing weapons
(like Klingon's wing phasers on the D-7's or the ISC's rear I-
torps), you are good candidate for battle run.
8.1.4 The Feint
A feint is basically a maneuver to get your opponent out of
balance. In SFC, it's a maneuver of deception to get your enemy
to commit to countering one of your moves when you really intend
something else.
For example, the HET reversal below [8.2.3] is a feint. He
countered your battle run with pursuit, so you suddenly turn it
into an overrun instead.
There are many ways to do "feints". For enemies who seem to have
an answer for everything, a feint can do wonders.
8.1.5 The Saber dance
The Klingons invented the "saber dance" maneuver. Basically, the
enemy ship stays at range 15, where the disruptors have a better
chance to hit than other weapons. The enemy ship then repeats the
maneuver, keeping the range open, while it wears down your
shields.
The Hydrans can use the saber dance with their Hellbores the same
way, but their weapon arcs aren't as nicely designed as the
Klingons and require a bit more maneuvering to stay away.
Saber dance requires patience and very good weapon arcs. One
mistake and the enemy may get close enough to do you real damage.
8.1.6 The Starcastle
This tactic can be effective against races that have low "peak
output" and prefer to nibble you at medium range, like Klingons.
This is a counter against the "saber dance" maneuver.
Basically, it means go at speed 4, maximum ECM, erratic maneuver
(EM), max shield reinforcements on facing shield, and wait for
the enemy. At maximum jamming and EM, it's doubtful attack at
range 15 will do any damage.
The enemy must close in to do any damage. You can then switch to
an overrun or oblique pass. This turns a maneuver battle into a
knife-fight.
8.2 HIGH-ENERGY TURN, WHY AND WHEN
High-energy turn gives you a sudden change in direction (payoff)
in exchange for some disadvantages (power expenditure) and risk
(possibility of breakdown).
HET uses a significant amount of power (5 movement pts) so you
have to be sure you don't need it for anything else.
Ships that cannot make an HET safely ever (i.e. breakdown chance
of less than 100%) should probably NOT make one, ever. A
breakdown will almost kill that ship for sure.
There are basically three reasons to use an HET: sudden problem,
defensive turn, surprise attack
8.2.1 Sudden problem
An HET can be used to get away from a sudden problem to buy some
time to deal with it. Say, a scatter pack was launched in front
of you and you can't turn away in time and you're out of weapons,
or a plas-R coming at you. Turn away and you may get some time to
deal with them.
8.2.2 Defensive HET
A defensive HET is using an HET to bring a fresh shield into
play, so enemy won't be able to pound a weakened or down shield.
HET takes time to charge, so you have to plan this ahead of time.
If you suddenly decide you need one, it would have been too late.
8.2.3 Surprise attack
Generally, you want to ship to follow you, slow enough not to
catch you yet too fast to weasel (except with EmerDecel). Use a
feint to get the enemy to commit to a counter. Then use an HET
reversal [8.3.2].
8.3 EMERGENCY DECELERATION
EmerDecel is most often used to slow the ship down so you can
launch a wild weasel. This also reinforces the front shields
slightly.
EmerDecel does NOT conserve power.
EmerDecel DOES slow you down, which may prevent you from
revealing one of your down shields.
EmerDecel can be used when the enemy is closing faster than
expected.
EmerDecel can save you from collisions.
ISC ships may use EmerDecel to reduce closure rate with the
target so it can get more PPD pulses off.
The price of EmerDecel is speed 0, which gives the enemy the
initiative. He can take the time to recharge weapons, even
disengage. He can go to your rear shields and pound it. He can
wait and do a Gorn anchor on you when the weasel expires. You
can't do anything about it.
Consider how WILL you get back to battle speed BEFORE you use
EmerDecel. How do you dodge drones or plasma torps now that
you've stopped? How long will it take for you to get back up to
speed? Can you survive till then?
8.4 ADVANCED MANEUVERS
The advanced maneuvers involve using HETs in combination of
simple maneuvers.
8.4.1 The Flanking Snap Turn
This is a continuation of the oblique pass if both sides simply
keep going. Basically you pass down the side of the enemy so your
3 o'clock is at his 9 o'clock, or vice versa. THEN you use an HET
so you can bring your weapons to bear on his side/rear shields,
which are probably weaker than his front shields.
To counter the flanking snap turn, keep your distance in the
oblique pass. A T-bomb or two and a turn-away would help also.
Then you can use an HET reversal after you've damaged his front
shields.
8.4.2 The HET Reversal
At the oblique approach, you turn out, the enemy turns in, and
he's now chasing you, hoping to hit your weaker rear shields. You
then suddenly use an HET to bring your front-weapons to bear and
turn it into an overrun.
To counter this, you just have to be careful. If the enemy looks
like he's overloading, don't chase too close!
8.4.3 Anti-anchor
If you have plenty of point-blank firepower (like Hydrans)
fighting plasma or drone user who's likely to anchor (like Gorn
or Mirak), consider the anti-anchor.
Maneuver so the enemy is about to catch you on the side, HET
ready to go, all weapons overloaded. When the enemy tractor you,
HET into him and blast him. He's probably expecting you to fight
his tractor and would have put a lot of power into it. You
instead put the energy into shield reinforcements.
Net result... Instead of losing, both ships are heavily damaged.
At least you salvage a draw. You MAY even win it if you have good
damage control and other sources of firepower (like fighters and
so on).
8.5 SPECIAL MANEUVERS
Special maneuvers use specific devices (such as tractors),
weapons, and so on to exploit a specific characteristic.
8.5.1 Anchor
The "anchor" maneuver was "invented" by the Gorn, as it makes
their plasma torpedoes very effective and makes maneuvering
minimal. The concept is very simple: slap a tractor beam on the
enemy ship, THEN shoot the torpedoes.
Why do it this way? A ship being tractored cannot launch a decoy
shuttle (i.e. wild weasel), so they will have to shoot the
torpedoes or let them hit. At point-blank range, they can't
rotate a new shield into play quickly.
Any race using seeking weapons can use the anchor. A frigate can
kill a cruiser if the anchor was deployed properly. Scatter-pack
is very useful here as it suddenly pops 6 or more missiles at a
target that can't launch decoys.
An anchor can be enhanced by NOT firing all your weapons in a
single salvo. Instead, fire in several small salvoes to gain
maximum damage from the Mizia attack [see 6.10].
An anchor combined with HET can be devastating. You shoot, you
score, and you turn away in an instant without giving enemy much
chance to shoot back. This requires very good timing though.
Some ships should NEVER be anchored. Fusion-beam armed Hydrans
can be deadly (to you) to anchor. A smaller ship should NOT
attempt to tractor a larger ship unless it is going for the
deadweight maneuver, and even then
Anchor can be defeated by NEVER coming into tractor range. You
can keep the enemy away by using some mines to "encourage" him to
go somewhere else. You may even want to use an HET to turn away
ASAP.
Another way to defeat the anchor is to pre-charge the tractor
beam to REPEL. Choose the strength you want to repel, up to 6.
You can then repel all tractors charged up to that strength.
Hydrans have a similar maneuver discussed in their race specific
section.
8.5.2 Deadweight
The "deadweight" maneuver is a maneuver used by the Mirak. The
maneuver is very similar to the anchor. Basically, one lighter
ship serves as the "deadweight". The lighter ship arms minimal
weapons, gets in there, tractors the enemy ship, reinforces
facing shield, and come to a FULL STOP. That enemy is now
severely limited in its mobility. Even SLOW drones now will catch
up to the enemy ship.
Even better... The lighter ship fires its drones and weapons, and
takes the return salvo on the reinforced shield for minimum or no
damage. Now the target has no more weapons to defend itself, and
are vulnerable to weapons from other ships. It can't even dump a
weasel to protect itself.
8.5.3 Plasma String
Sometimes called a "plasma bid", this is used by the plasma using
races, mainly the Romulans.
Basically, you start randomly mixing the real and the pseudo
plasma torpedoes one at a time at a certain interval. The enemy
can't tell which one is real or not. Even if you shot 3
torpedoes when you have only 2 launchers, he still wouldn't know
which one is the fake. He will have to dump a weasel at some
point if he's slow enough.
It is called a "bid" because you keep raising the ante with more
torpedoes until he "blinks" and launches a weasel.
Then you wipe out the weasel, anchor him, and feed him the rest
of your torpedoes. He should run out of shuttles before you run
out of torpedoes.
Plasma string can be countered by speed and distance, like the
general anti-plasma tactics.
8.5.4 Drone Swarm
The swarm can be a scary sight for races not armed with anti-
drone weapons. Mirak is the primary drone swarm user, though any
race with drones (Feds, Klingons) can do a swarm also with the
right ship(s).
Basically, you have a LOT of drones (more than 6) all targeting
one ship and travel in close proximity. You can help create a
swarm by using a scatter-pack if your internal launchers can't
create a swarm.
Remember that each ship has a drone control limit. If you exceed
it, the earliest drones you fired are lost. Most ships can
control 6 drones (single drone control), some ships can control
12 (double drone control) or 18 (triple drone control).
Obviously, faster the drones, the more dangerous they are. Fast
drones can chase down fast ships, are less vulnerable to anti-
drone fire, and so on.
The swarm can be beaten with a nicely placed T-bomb. It is also
not that useful on ships equipped with ADDs, ESGs, and other anti-
drone weapons.
9 Offense
There are a lot of ways to do damage to the enemy
9.1 PHASERS
Phasers are the most energy-efficient weapons in the game. A ph-1
can do up to 10 pts of damage with 1 pt of energy. Heavy weapons
don't come close. However, ph-1 is the largest phaser a starship
can mount.
Everybody uses phasers in one form or another. They are all
treated as "phasers" in terms of SFC even though their innards
may be somewhat different.
9.2 DIRECT-FIRE HEAVY WEAPONS
Direct-fire heavy weapons hits (or misses) facing shield
immediately. In general those don't hit that often unless you're
very close.
Some heavy weapons like hellbores and PPDs can damage non-facing
shields.
If you are very close, you can usually overload, but that will
reduce your speed significantly by making less power available.
Overloaded weapons also have limited range.
9.3 SEEKING HEAVY WEAPONS
Mirak, Gorn, and Romulan use seeking weapons.
Those in general pack a much larger punch than firect-fire
weapons, but you can't hit the facing shield.
There are also ways to reduce the impact of the weapons. Plasma
torpedoes can be reduced by phaser fire. Drones can be killed by
phasers or ADDs, kept away by tractors, or blasted by T-bombs.
Drone users also have to watch out for the drone control limit of
their ship(s).
Drones don't cost any energy to launch, but you can exhaust your
reloads in a long battle. Drones also in general travel at a
lower speed.
Plasma torpedo never "run out" (unlike drones), but it takes a
LONG time to charge (3 times as long as disruptor) and takes
energy. They also dissipate over distance traveled.
Plasma users can use a pseudo-torpedo to scare the enemy. It
looks JUST like a regular torpedo, but causes no damage. You can
use the pseudo-torpedo to hide the fact that you're still
recharging.
Enveloping plasma torpedo can be used to "sandpaper" the shields
and perhaps hit a down shield. This can wear down the enemy ship
for later attacks.
If there are multiple targets, a plasma torpedo can be used in
"shotgun" mode which shoots several smaller torpedoes against
multiple targets.
Drone users can use scatter-pack to increase the number of
missiles in a salvo, at the cost of using a shuttle and the
possibility of having that shuttle shot down before it can "pop".
9.4 OTHER HEAVY WEAPONS
ESG can be used for ramming, which can be a very effective weapon
that can beat down enemy's facing shield(s).
ESG is also a good defensive weapon, as it kills fighters,
shuttles, and drones.
9.5 HIT-AND RUN RAIDS
Hit-and-run raids can kill specific ship systems on an enemy
ship, subject to transporter, boarding party, and energy
availability.
9.6 MINES AND T-BOMBS
Mines and T-bombs, when placed properly, can cause significant
damage to enemy ships, fighters, shuttles, PFs, etc.
9.7 TRACTOR/TERRAIN
One of the most satisfying ways to kill enemy ship is by pushing
the enemy ship into an asteroid or a planet. This can be hard to
arrange though, and is considered "bad manners" if done in a
Dynaverse battle against human opponent.
Terrain such as dust fields can cause damage to shields, and if
shields are down, cause damage to the ship directly. Therefore,
when fighting in a dust field, you may want to target the front-
shield of the enemy ship(s).
9.8 SHUTTLES/FIGHTERS
Shuttles and fighters have phasers, heavy weapons, and drones
which can be used to defend you, defend others ships, or to
attack other ships (from long range or close assault).
Suicide shuttle is just another seeking weapon (albeit a very
slow one).
10 Defense
How to prevent your ship from being damaged while dealing damage
to the enemy ships is very important. After all, this quote said
it best.
"You don't serve your country by dying for your country. You
serve your country by making the OTHER poor bastard die for HIS
country."
--- General George S. Patton, US Army
10.1 "SPEED IS LIFE"
Speed, when your ship is heading in the proper direction, gives
you more time to deal with the incoming threats. You can run
until the plasma torp run out of juice. You can run until the
drones run out of juice. You can run to keep enemy out of
overload range so he can't hit you if his weapons are overloaded.
NONE of this can happen if you do NOT have speed!
10.2 USE EW!
Electronic warfare, at long to medium range, is more efficient in
reducing damage than shield reinforcements. With max ECM and EM,
you should rarely if ever take damage at medium range.
10.3 REINFORCE FACING SHIELD(S)
You can use any excess energy for shield reinforcements. This
would prevent "premature" wear on your shields when the enemy is
just firing some long-range shots.
Only shields that are still "up" can be reinforced. So if a
shield has been busted, there's no point in reinforcing it.
10.4 TURN A NEW SHIELD AROUND
If the enemy beats down one of your shields, maneuver and present
a different shield. Use HET if you have to!
10.5 "USE YOUR TRACTORS! DAMMIT!"
Seeking weapons such as missiles, suicide shuttles, and so on,
can be kept away by tractor beams. You can set the number of
tractors to use for defense in your "defense" control panel.
10.6 LEAVE SOME PHASERS FOR POINT-DEFENSE!
Are your phasers armed and ready for your own ship's defense? If
you have point-defense set your phasers will automatically engage
nearby seeking weapons such as plasma torpedoes and drones. Of
course, that also means that you will not have those phasers to
shoot at enemies.
10.7 AVOID THE ENEMY'S WEAPON ARCS
If you know the enemy's weapon arcs you know which sides of the
enemy ship to avoid. Few enemy ships can fire into the hex
directly behind the ship.
10.8 WATCH THE ENEMY SHIP DISPLAY
That tells you a LOT about weapons under repair, being recharged,
and so on. Best time to attack is when the enemy cannot fire
back! You need to be close, or use a probe.
10.9 WATCH THE RANGE!
If the enemy is going fast, he is probably not overloading, so
close assault should not be a problem.
If the enemy is going slow, he may be overloading, so you should
stay out of overload range.
Of course, these two are not rules, but general observations. You
can "trick" the enemy into you're overloading when you're not by
moving slower than you can, and so on.
Stay away from plasma users as they need to be close to do
significant damage.
11 Tactics and Counter-Tactics
Here, we discuss some common questions on how to use plasma
weapons, and drones, and how to counter each.
11.1 PLASMA TACTICS
First, let us discuss the strengths and weaknesses of a plasma
torpedo. Remember, deception and confusion are primary tactics
for plasma torpedoes.
11.1.1 Plasma Strengths
Plasma torpedoes deliver a LOT of damage in a compact package.
Plasma torpedo has some of the highest crunch power available.
Plasma weapons are seeking. As long as the launcher is in arc you
can shoot and maneuver away.
Plasma torpedoes are fast (speed 36). [NOT 32 as previously
reported]
Plasma torpedoes are flexible: you can regular, download,
envelope, or shotgun.
Plasma torpedo can be fired (for a limited time) AFTER the weapon
has been destroyed
Enveloping plasma torp is essentially the ONLY overloaded weapon
without the 8-hex limit.
11.1.2 Plasma Weaknesses
Plasma takes a LONG time to charge (3 times the period needed by
disruptors).
Plasma takes a lot of energy to charge.
Plasma, as a seeking weapon, give the target a choice on which
shield to expose.
Plasma dissipates as it travels, losing its punch.
Plasma can be further dissipated by phaser fire
Plasma can be distracted by a wild weasel (i.e. sensor decoy)
Plasma launchers are NOT 360 degrees. (Some Gorn launchers have
wider arcs)
11.1.3 Dealing with recharge period
To counter the long recharge period, do NOT fire ALL of the your
torpedoes at once. Fire them one at a time. (This is the
foundation of the "plasma string" tactic, see 8.3.2). By
staggering the reload cycle you also minimize the energy problem.
On the other hand, that also means you're spreading out your
firepower. By spreading your firepower, enemy can choose which
shield he would want to take the hit on. You risk the chance of
not hitting the same shield.
Downloading, by generating type-F plasmas in two turns in larger
tubes, also helps with the long recharge period, as the expense
of some crunch power.
11.1.4 Dealing with dissipation
To solve the dissipation problem, you need to launch the torpedo
as close to the target as possible. Launch close also prevent the
enemy ship from turning a new shield. However, launching close
exposes you to his counter-fire. It also reveals your charging
cycle to his sensors.
The foundation of the "anchor" (see 8.3.1) is on getting as close
as possible.
Torpedoes are great against stationary targets like bases, which
can't dodge.
If the enemy ship will not expose a down shield, an enveloping
torpedo may be the answer. While that takes more energy, it can
go through down shields, as well as damage all the other shields
for later penetration.
11.1.5 Dealing with phasers
You can't really do much about enemy phasers except launch
several torpedoes or offer them other targets than your torpedo.
Using pseudo-torps can make them waste phasers as well.
11.1.6 Dealing with weasel
The "cure" for weasel is the anchor. If you tractor a target, the
enemy cannot launch weasel. Of course, the trick is getting close
enough to do it.
On the other hand, taking a weasel isn't that bad. Most ships
have very limited number of shuttles and it takes a long time to
charge a weasel. Once he's out, he's toast. You can always just
charge another torpedo.
The ship that launches a weasel also loses the initiative and
thus is quite vulnerable to anything you do. Just be prepared to
take advantage of it.
11.1.7 Be unpredictable
Plasma users need to be unpredictable. With so many options and
combinations, you need to confuse your enemy as to your actual
operating pattern.
Your opponent will try to guess your reload cycle and attack
while your torpedoes are recharging. How do you minimize your
vulnerability during that time is critical to your survival, you
do that by being unpredictable.
To completely confuse enemy regarding your reload cycle, you can
download to a smaller torpedo, or use a pseudo torpedo. Download
charges a torpedo faster, thus taking only 2 turns or even 1 turn
for a torpedo. Pseudo disguises your shots.
11.1.8 When to use Enveloping
An opening salvo of enveloping torpedoes can surprise a lot of
opponents. As you run away, the enveloping torpedo "sandpaper"
all of your opponent's shields. Subsequent torpedoes would have
much better chance to break through.
In fleet action, when there's more weapons going around, some can
go enveloping to confuse the enemy.
11.1.9 When to use shotgun
Shotgun, with the restriction on targeting, means it's mainly a
defensive weapon used when there are a LOT of targets, like PFs,
frigates, fighters, and so on.
11.1.10 When to Underload
Personally, I underload after the first salvo is shot. I don't
like to run away (as I need the power to arm the weapons), so I
prefer to underload and get the weapons up faster.
11.1.11 Keeping the enemy away during recharge period
You are vulnerable during the recharge period. So keeping the
enemy away during the recharge period is the key.
One of the best ways to keep the enemy away is with a pseudo-
torp, and that's discussed in the next section.
Another possibility is a mini minefield from either T-bombs or
Nuclear Space Mine (if you're a Romulan). You hide behind the
mines while you reload. However, this can be very difficult to
arrange, and is more of a theoretical exercise. It is difficult
to put into practice. For a more practical method, try leaving T-
bomb or two and hide behind them while you reload.
T-bombs are also excellent drone defense when you're fighting a
drone user. Your plasma torps are not vulnerable to t-bombs.
Another way to keep the enemy away is with the cloaking device.
Actually, it doesn't keep the enemy away, it just make you harder
to hit when the enemy does get close. The problem then is getting
AWAY from the enemy when you're ready to decloak. When you
decloak, you're at the MOST vulnerable stage.
If you have speed, you can just stay away from the enemy that
way. But if you have speed, you may not have enough to recharge.
11.1.12 Deploying Pseudo-Torps
In general, Pseudo-torp is used when you want to make the enemy
think it's a REAL torpedo when it is not. There are three
situations: you want to keep the enemy AWAY, you want the enemy
to waste phasers, or you want the enemy to pop a weasel.
If you want the enemy to stay away while you recharge, a pseudo
can do that. However, if the enemy is careful in timing your
recharge, or pays careful attention to his sensors (or use a
probe), he can guess pretty well if that torpedo is real or not.
A pseudo torpedo will cause the enemy to use up their phasers,
hopefully on the pseudo instead of the real torpedo. As most
people leave point-defense on auto, firing a pseudo first can
soak up the phasers.
You can force the enemy to pop a weasel if you have enough
torpedoes in the air, and he doesn't know which ones are real or
fake. As fighter pilots say, "honor the threat!" Your enemy must
treat each torpedo as a real one if he is not sure. That is the
foundation of the "plasma string" tactic (see 8.3.2).
11.2 COUNTER PLASMA TACTICS
A lot of new players (newbies) have problem fighting the plasma
races. The AI fires off all three plasmas... The newbie tried to
maneuver. The three plasmas hit the same shield, wrecking his
ship. Then the AI ship fires phasers... And the newbie blew up.
Well, this section is for the newbie. Welcome to plasma avoidance
101.
Please read 11.1.1 and 11.1.2 to review strengths and weaknesses
of the plasma torpedo.
11.2.1 Use your speed and distance
To counter plasma races, you need to keep your speed up and keep
your distance from the enemy ships. By keeping the range open,
you give time for the plasma to dissipate. If he waste his
plasma, he will have to get away from you to recharge. You can
then pound him during his recharge cycle.
Of course, that's assuming you're NOT dealing with a pseudo.
Changing speed can help here. Start slow, switch to fast when the
enemy is likely to launch, take the hit, turn back to slow to get
your weapons recharged and fired.
11.2.2 Use your sensors!
If you scan the enemy ship, you can see if his torpedoes are
recharging of not (if you are close enough). If you know when his
torpedoes are recharging, then the torpedo in flight must be a
pseudo. If you know when his torpedoes are charging, then you
know when to attack!
If you are NOT close enough, you can use a probe.
11.2.3 Use all your shields!
You can virtually choose which shield you want to let the seeking
weapon hit. While most people assume that would be the rear
shields, you COULD let the torpedo hit a front shield. If the
enemy ship fire torpedoes one at a time, you can take them on all
different shields.
If he fires all of the plasma torpedoes, he just spat away most
of his firepower. After dealing with the torpedo, you can pound
him during his reload cycle. (Assuming no pseudos, of course)
There is also of course, the wild weasel. After those torpedoes
hit, you can accelerate away and hopefully still catch the guy
before he recharges.
11.2.4 Counter the pseudo
You may want to allow the dissipated torpedo to hit a shield of
your choice, so you can tell whether it is a pseudo or not.
In SFC2 you get an infinite number of pseudos (albeit there's a
long "recharge" time). So counting the pseudo doesn't help that
much. Still, knowing that you got hit by a pseudo vs. a real
torpedo helps if you can keep a clear count.
11.2.5 Counter the anchor
To counter the anchor, don't get close to a plasma ship, and
always charge repel tractors. Anchor prevents the 'weasel'
defense. Speed and distance again are the critical factors here.
I personally consider the weasel as a last resort, which is why I
am usually NOT afraid of the anchor.
11.2.6 Against cloaking plasma users
Cloak guys may actually be EASIER to kill than you think. In
SFC2, the cloakers CAN be found. In fact, you can designate a
cloaked ship, you just can't lock-on to it. That simply means
that 1) you can only use direct-fire weapons to shoot at him and
2) you may not do much damage to him unless you're point-blank.
Plasma takes energy to charge, and so does cloak. So a cloaker
need to be QUITE slow to do both. That means you have PLENTY of
time to fry a cloaker if you keep your speed up.
While I DID say it's dangerous to get close to a plasma ship,
keep in mind that a cloaker takes time to decloak. During that
time, he's NOT under the protection of cloak AND he's vulnerable
to weapons.
If you can catch him while he's reloading under cloak, even
better! You can make two to three different passes and he'll
still be recharging.
A point-blank alpha strike CAN still work. It may not do as much
damage, but it will still damage a shield. And he can't stay
"under" forever.
Catch the cloaker with a drone swarm or alpha strike right as he
decloak on his rear shield, and turn away to disengage. He'll
have to build up speed to catch you again, if he survives the
swarm.
11.2.7 Worst-case scenario: the wild weasel
In general, I don't like weasels. You only have a certain number
of weasels (none if you don't charge any). Using a weasel also
gives up the initiative to the plasma user.
However, if you are sure you can take whatever else he's got
left, then wild weasel can be a good choice. Launch a weasel and
let the torpedoes hit the weasel. Then accelerate away and catch
the plasma user in an alpha strike.
11.3 DRONE TACTICS
I prefer the term "drones" to "missiles". I started playing SFB
in the 1990's and I tend to use the SFB terms. Any way, let's see
what are the advantage and disadvantages of drones.
[Some tips summarized from "Drone Tractics" by Alan M. Gopin from
the SFB Tactics Manual]
11.3.1 Drone advantages
Drones deliver a LOT of damage in a compact package. Type IV
drones cause a LOT of damage, esp. if you can get a salvo to hit
the same shield.
Drones are seeking weapons. They are "fire-and-forget".
Drones are 360-degree weapons: no firing arc restrictions
Drones cost NO energy to launch
Drones CAN be fast (though that cost a LOT of prestige pts)
11.3.2 Drone disadvantages
There are a TON of ways to kill drones (see 11.3.7).
Drones cost a lot of prestige pts if you want faster/fastest
speed, and need to be replaced after every battle
Drones, as seeking weapons, give the target a choice on which
shield to expose.
Drones can be distracted by a wild weasel
Drones are subject to control channel limits
Once you're out of drones, you're out, period.
11.3.3 Mass and Timing
Mass means create a swarm of drones, so the target's defenses are
completely overwhelmed. However, this is subject to control
limits and launch rate limits.
Mass also means the swarm is vulnerable to a single t-bomb, and
to a lesser extent, the wild weasel (sensor decoy).
Timing means you need to get all the drones to the target as
simultaneously as possible to help with "mass". You need to
minimize the time the target has to defend itself against the
drones, and try to time the arrival so as many of the drones will
hit the same shield.
11.3.4 Picking the target
A slow ship can't outrun the drones, so should be an excellent
drone target. Slow, of course, depends on how fast YOUR drones
are. A slow ship also can't turn fast enough to present another
shield, thus even MORE vulnerable.
A ship that has just fired most of its phasers is a good target,
as it won't be able to defend itself against more drones unless
it has a LOT of tractors and AMD/ADD. You can tell that by your
scanners (or a probe).
A ship that is away from the rest of its fleet's defense zones is
also a good target.
A closer target is better than a far away target as it takes less
time for the drones to hit it.
A ship coming closer is better than a ship moving away. The
higher closing speed means he'll have less time to defend against
it.
11.3.5 Drones as defense
If enemy chases you, firing back to them. Drone has 360 degree
fire and thus can cover your escape. His "tail chase" also
decreases his reaction time to defend against the drones fired
"downstream".
Drones is also a good way to defend yourself against ESG ram.
Throw out enough drones out there and you can take minimal damage
against ESG ram on your shields.
The Lyrans under AI control don't seem to defend themselves with
ESG if you're out to long range.
11.3.6 Scatter-pack
Pros: dramatically increases the launch rate from 1-2 to 6 drones
Cons: Uses a shuttle, pack itself is vulnerable before it "pops",
can overwhelm control limit
Scatter-pack can be useful if you are sure the enemy cannot kill
it before it pops. If you drop one before an overrun (say, range
15) it should pop right when you meet the enemy ship. This
requires good timing.
Make SURE you have control channels available or you'll be
wasting previously launched drones.
You can launch it close to the enemy if you are SURE enemy has no
weapons left to kill it.
To defend against scatter-packs, try to kill one before it
"pops". Else, it's standard drone defense.
11.3.7 Spread them out if you can
A swarm is a concentrated target. You should spread the drones
out so one t-bomb or one counter would not get all of them.
You need to set the launch racks to "one missile" instead of "all
missiles". Then you just need t launch multiple times with a
slight gap in between. Leaving the gap in between would give the
enemy a bit of a breathing room, but also makes your swarm
multiple smaller targets. You need to determine what IS the
optimum gap... So the salvo is still concentrated enough to be a
swarm, yet separate enough so one T-bomb won't get them all.
Obviously you can't control a scatter pack...
11.3.8 Mediums are the best compromise
The medium speed drones are the best compromise between
capability and prestige cost. The "fast" drones just cost too
much, esp. if you need a LOT of reloads.
You probably want Type-IV drones instead of Type-I. While get
half as much Type-IV's as Type-I's, the Type-IV's, if hit, do
TWICE the damage.
11.3.9 Do the anchor
A Mirak anchor is just as dangerous as a Gorn anchor if you
perform it correctly. A full salvo of 6 type-IV drones will
severely maul a cruiser and kill lighter ships.
Anchor also makes SLOW drones dangerous.
You can even anchor another ship to slow it down so slow drones
launched by other ships can catch up to it. This is sometimes
called the "deadweight" maneuver.
Combine an anchor with a scatter-pack can be completely
overwhelming. Imagine this scenario... You dropped a scatter-pack
before you enter weapons range. You snagged the enemy just as the
scatter-pack popped, before he can pop a weasel. He shot down 1-2
and stopped another 3 via tractors. THEN you feed him a salvo
from your internal launchers AND your alpha strike from your
other weapons.
11.3.10 Counter-counter tactics
A swarm sure look scary, but there are a LOT of ways to stop
drones. To recap, here's the list:
* phaser (in point-defense mode)
* tractor beam (in point-defense mode)
* anti-drone launchers (ADDs) (in point-defense mode)
* Transporter bombs (beam them or drop them)
* Wild weasel (takes care of ALL seeking weapons targeting
you)
* ECM (which can reduce the damage)
* ESG (absorbs all physical hits, including drones)
* Another drone (yes, you can launch a drone at another drone)
* Terrain features (planets, asteroids, dust field, etc.)
Let us discuss each of the counter and discuss how to counter
that.
11.3.11 Phaser
You can make the enemy use up the phaser so it is not available
shoot your drones. Basically, you need to offer the enemy ship
something else to shoot at, and usually, that would be yourself.
Shuttles are usually too valuable to be 'spent' like this, but
they are a possibility.
On the other hand, you can shoot the drones to let the enemy
spend the phasers on the drones instead of you. That's usually
what Klingons do.
11.3.12 Tractor Beam and ADD/AMD
You can't do much about tractor beams and AMDs, except with hit-
and-run raids. To do that, you need to expose yourself to counter-
fire. However, AMDs have a fixed number of "shots" and need to
reload. If you can make the AMDs expend themselves, the firing
ship will be vulnerable for a period of time while the AMD
reloads.
If you are slightly faster than the incoming drones, turn so the
tractored drones are behind you, then turn off the tractors to
leave the drones behind. Now your tractors can be used to
intercept MORE incoming drones.
11.3.13 T-Bombs
T-Bomb can kill a large group of drones at once. To beat that,
spread your drones out by firing at slight intervals instead of
one single swarm. So one T-bomb will kill only a few.
11.3.14 Wild Weasel
You can't do much about the wild weasel except to note that a WW
user surrenders the initiative and speed completely. The WW user
also used up one of the shuttles, which is always in short
supply.
Once you got the initiative, don't ever give it back.
You can always do the anchor, which negates the weasel.
11.3.15 ECM
ECM is not an efficient way to counter drones. You can slightly
reduce the damage from a drone, but minimally only.
11.3.16 ESG
If you are a Lyran, ESG is a good drone defense tool. Keep the
radius to a minimum for maximum stopping power. If you're
fighting a Lyran, use shuttles and other things to pop the ESG
before the drones hit. This is sometimes called the "FOD
maneuver" (after "Foreign Object Damage", a military term used to
describe misc. trash sucked into jet engines).
You can counter the ESG defense by a "reverse ESG ram", which
means YOU take the hit instead of the drones. You charge in just
ahead of the drones so the drones would survive and hit the
enemy.
11.3.17 Another drone
ONE drone can kill only ONE drone. So you have to target
individual drones individually. Slow the game down may help.
Note that AI don't do counter-drone launches.
11.3.18 Terrain Features
Enemy can fly behind objects so the drones can fly into them.
However, this requires a fairly crowded map. If you have a pretty
empty map, there's nothing to hide behind.
11.4 COUNTER-DRONE TACTICS
In general, if you run the drone user out of drones, you would
win as they lose most of their "punch".
11.4.1 DO NOT PANIC!
A typical cruiser can easily stop 6 or more drones. Tractors
alone can stop 3-4 drones. Phasers, ADDs, and so on can stop 2-4
more. Don't forget your shields can stop one or two easily
without taking too much damage.
11.4.2 Use ALL your anti-drone weapons
If you need a reminder, read 11.3.7 for the full list. Beware of
all the "counter-counters" they can use. So read that section and
see what THEY can do against your anti-drone weapons.
You should almost ALWAYS turn on point-defense tractors and point-
defense phasers unless you're flying against races that do NOT
use drones. Your point-defense phasers are tractors are your
PRIMARY anti-drone weapons, other than your ADD/AMD.
ESG is a great drone defense weapon if you got one. Remember to
raise them BEFORE the drones arrive. Set radius 0.
11.4.3 Remember COUNTER-DRONES
A drone CAN hit ANOTHER drone. So USE THEM! If you have low drone
launch rates fighting a fast-drone-firing enemy, one good use of
the drones is hit incoming drones.
11.4.4 Keep your speed up
Slow drones aren't that dangerous unless you get anchored, and
the enemy must get close to you to do that. If you keep you speed
up, you can keep your distance and give you time to deal with all
the drones "in the air".
You can run medium drones out if you just fly around the map
slightly faster than they are.
If you keep the speed up you have more time to deal with fast
drones.
11.4.5 Find help
All friendly ship will assist in drone defense. Play against the
AI and you'll see other ships fire at nearby drones using ADDs,
tractors, and so on as they see drone swarms aimed at one of
their own units. Your friendly units will do the same, if you are
near them.
11.5 FIGHTER TACTICS
Using your fighters optimally is a difficult subject, as fighters
don't exactly follow your commands.
11.5.1 Understanding and exploiting fighter AI
The fighter has four modes: attack, harass, defend, and defend
me.
Attack means an all-out charge... Fire distance weapons when
close enough, then close up with phasers on strafing runs.
Harass means stay at mid-range if possible, constantly shooting
phasers and other weapons (if available).
Defend / defend me means stay close to the target / carrier and
attack nearby enemy units.
Attack is useful when you will be joining the attack, as the
enemy must divide weapons among you and your fighters. You all go
for overruns and gut the enemy in one huge alpha strike. Usually,
the fighters bring down a shield and you shoot through it. You
will lose many fighters, but you'll get results.
Harass is useful when you just want to keep the enemy occupied
while you reload. You'll lose less fighters, but they won't do as
much damage.
In general, it's better to let the fighters go first and you try
to follow them to exploit the damage they do. You can set your
ship to follow the fighters. As you can't control the fighters,
only yourself, this gives you more chances to exploit any down
shields. If you do the damage, the fighters may not be smart
enough to shoot through the downed shield you caused.
AI ships with fighters tend to just "attack" instead of harass,
and thus the fighters are often lost. Replacing the fighters can
be a drain on your prestige points.
11.5.2 Launch immediately, or wait until after first pass?
Do you follow the fighters in, or do you go in first and the
fighters follow you?
Due to the lack of control over the fighters, it's probably
better to follow the fighters in and take advantage of any damage
they do. Which means you launch early.
I'd probably make an exception for Hydran hellbore-armed
fighters. For those, I'd make an initial pass to beat down an
enemy shield, THEN launch them to get some damage through that
down shield.
11.5.3 Load them back!
One of the biggest mistakes fighter users commit is NOT recalling
their fighters when they should have. After fighter exhausted
their payload (heavy weapons, drones, whatever) they are left
with only phasers. Their firepower is halved or less and they are
more vulnerable to enemy fire as they must get close to do
damage.
Reload in SFC is quite fast so check if your fighters have fired
their payload and recall them, then launch them again when they
are reloaded!
Look at them fight. If they have expended their ordnance, then
recall them For their loadout, see the last section, 30
11.5.4 Convoy Raiding
Carriers are GREAT raiding convoys. The fighters can be killing
the ships while the carrier keeps the escort busy. Then you both
run for it.
11.5.5 Note on Hydran fighters
As Hydran ships tend to be a mix of hellbore vs. fusion beam, you
should pick the fighters to complement your ship. If you are
fusion beam only, pick hellbore armed fighters. If you have
plenty of hellbores, pick some fusion beam-armed fighters. That
way, you can exploit weaknesses made by the other.
11.5.6 Drone-Armed Fighters
Drone armed fighters are VERY dangerous in large groups, as they
can suddenly double or triple drone launch rate.
Once I was flying a Mirak battle carrier (BCV) when I was
fighting another cruiser (and several other ships, both friendly
and enemy). I launched my squadrons and they are off. I just sent
a swarm from internal launchers AND a scatter-pack toward this
Lyran CA. He turned up the ESG and together with tractors, took
out all the drones. I was turning away when my fighters group-
launched THEIR drones at the CA... And crippled it in ONE salvo,
when no less than 12 drones hit the same shield, gutting it.
After another burst of phasers, the CA's toast.
However, once the fighters exhaust their payload, you need to
call them back and rearm them. And that takes time.
A drone-armed fighter without drones is nearly useless. While it
still has its phasers, and multiple fighters together CAN make a
dent in your shields, a single fighter must get close to do
damage, and that also means it is in range of enemy weapons, such
as phasers, AMD (ADD), and even T-bombs.
11.5.7 Heavy-Weapon Armed Fighters
Many heavy fighters are armed with heavy weapons (and can almost
be called bombers). They usually have very short range (typical
range is like 4). However, if they fire as a group the result can
still be quite devastating.
Hydrans should HOLD any Hellbore-armed fighters until AFTER the
initial pass, after the shield damage has been done and perhaps
down shields created. This will also give the ship a chance to
attempt to knock out any ADDs and phasers with H&R and weapons.
Hydran hellbore fighters should suffer minimal attrition as it is
the only fighter capable of doing significant damage at range 8
(the only fighter weapon to reach that far).
11.5.8 PFs and INTs
PFs and INTs, while more durable, are still vulnerable to heavier
weapons. They also don't fly in groups like fighters and
therefore are vulnerable to other weapons. They are also
vulnerable to the destruction of their carrier, esp. on those
light carriers like frigate PF tenders and so on. Use them and
use them hard.
11.6 ANTI-FIGHTER TACTICS
While fighters can be a threat, fighters are much easier to kill
than the ship they are based on (except when the carriers are
small, like frigate or destroyer-sized carriers).
Fighters CAN be killed by all sorts of weapons, from T-bombs to
drones, from phasers to ADDs. Let's examine them in roughly two
classes... The fighter-shuttles, and the PF/INT.
11.6.1 Fighters
Fighters fly in a group, and each group acts as a single entity.
They launch together, and they shoot together. Most fighters have
about 10 pts of health, which is actually not a lot.
See fighter list at the end [30] for a full list on who has what,
or see "ManualAdditions.doc" in your SFC2 directory.
Fighters are NOT shielded, which makes them killable from ANY
direction.
Fighters are fast, many can move as fast as ships.
Fighters are vulnerable to ALL weapons, but some do better than
others.
AMD/ADD do wonders on fighters, as will phasers in point-defense
if you get close enough. Just set point-defense on and try to get
close to the fighters.
A T-bomb in the middle of a fighter group can do wonders.
ESGs will go through fighters like a scythe through wheat.
Drones can kill fighters easily, but most fighters have phasers
to protect themselves. Still, if you can fire a few they may keep
the fighters away.
11.6.2 PF / INT
The PFs and INTs are big enough to get their own shields. On the
other hand, those shields are paper-thin (worse than a police
ship). Even a type-IV drone can kill a PF. The fighters are
actually harder to kill as the groups of fighters can protect
each other. PFs and INTs tend to fly alone and thus are
vulnerable individually.
11.6.3 Convoy Raids
For the defenders, fighters on convoy raids can be a nightmare,
as you have TWO targets you need to hit, both of them can kill
freighters.
If the carrier is relatively small and light, and you have high
crunch power, killing the carrier will take out all the fighters
and PFs and such. However, if the carrier is pretty big, you may
have to settle for killing fighters first.
11.7 CLOAK TACTICS
11.7.1 Underrun
11.7.2 Hit and Fade
11.8 ANTI-CLOAK TACTICS
There are several ways to defeat the cloak... The idea is to
convince the enemy commander that the cloak's disadvantages
outweighs the advantages it provides, so he won't use it. To do
that, you need to cause damage to the enemy WHILE it's under
cloak.
11.8.1 Flash bulb
One way to find a cloaked ship is via the "flash bulb" effect.
Basically, you drop a mine near the cloaked ship, right on top of
it if possible. It probably won't go off, but that's all right.
THEN you somehow detonate the mine, using a drone, a shuttle, or
even yourself. That explosion will cause the cloak to temporarily
lose its effects, allow other ships to lock-on. At that moment,
do your alpha strike and launch your seeking weapons. Ka-boom!
11.8.2 Blind Overrun
11.8.3 Plinking
11.9 FLEET TACTICS
11.9.1 Concentrate fire!
Concentrate your fire on ONE target. This may be obvious, but not
a lot of people seem to follow it. They let their ships run wily-
nily and blame the AI when their ships got whacked.
Concentrate your firepower on ONE enemy ship at a time (this
usually means you need to use "medium" order intensity so they
all shoot at the same target). You also need to be aware of your
other ships' positions so you can hit the same shield. This may
be a good time to order a different formation.
11.9.2 Exploit down shields!
Once a down shield has been exploited, set ships to "column"
formation and start circling the wounded enemy ship. One of your
ships will get to the down shield and exploit it.
11.9.3 Use formations!
Use your formation buttons! While there will be some maneuvering,
the formations allow you to get your ships in the right places to
exploit any openings.
11.9.4 Mutual Defense!
Keep your ships together so they can help each other defend
against drones, plasma, fighters, PFs, etc. Your fellow ships
will use their phasers, tractors, etc. to assist each other if
those enemies come in close enough.
11.9.5 Maintain fleet speed!
Your ships will do their best to keep up with you, but if you go
too fast, they will fall behind as they can't arm weapons AND
catch up to you. This is even worse if you order them to overload
weapons. So be careful there.
11.9.6 Remember capture!
With multiple ships under your command, captures should be
attempted whenever feasible. It yields plenty of bonus prestige
(esp. larger ships).
Just make sure you HAVE enough marines, and you don't
accidentally blow up the ship first (or have someone else blow it
up from under you).
Some freighters and most Orion ships cannot be captured, but you
should still get some bonus pts.
Beware that when in "capture" mode, your ships will NOT use any
"heavy weapons". Therefore, it is best to DISABLE ALL enemy ships
first, THEN worry about capturing them. If you try to capture
during the middle of a heavy battle, the other enemy ships will
pound you.
12 Introduction to Single-Player Dynaverse Campaign
This is an introduction to single player Dynaverse campaign.
12.1 SIGNING ON
When you start a new campaign, you choose a race and enter your
name. Then you get to read a lot of text while the map is
initialized.
When it's done, you're at the game map. You get a new frigate,
and you start in the interior of your empire.
Try the up and down arrow on the upper right (the two on the
right edge, not the 4-point star). That zooms in and out the map.
At the lowest zoom, you can see most of the map. At the highest
zoom, you can see other ships in the neighboring hexes.
12.2 LOOK AROUND AND MOVE AROUND THE MAP
The left menu has six commands: map, news, mission, supplies,
shipyard, and medals.
Please note the upper left corner, where you see your rank, your
ship, and your prestige points.
Your prestige points act as your "currency" in the Dynaverse. You
need them to get supplies, new ships, and so on. The only way you
earn them is to do well on the missions.
At [map], you can get information on each hex by right-click on
the hex. You'll get information on the hex, even hexes not
belonging to your empire. The numbers don't mean that much,
really.
The [news] button shows a screen that doesn't say that much.
Basically it's galaxy-wide news about how each empire is doing.
The more economy an empire has, the more and better ships that
empire can build and more and better ships become available in
the shipyard.
If there are missions available in that hex, the [mission] button
is click-able. Click on it to see the mission available in that
hex. Most missions are "non-essential" in that you can simply
choose to not accept. Those just show an "accept" button.
However, some missions are 'required' in that they show two
buttons: accept and forfeit. These "essential" missions carry a
forfeit penalty. You may even lose your biggest ship if you
forfeit. You will NOT be able to leave the hex until you choose
to accept or forfeit.
If you are at a sector with friendly base or planet, you see the
[supplies] and [starbase] buttons active. The [supplies] screen
let you buy supplies for your ship(s) with your prestige points.
The supplies available are basically shuttles (admin shuttles),
fighters (if the ship is a carrier), supplies (marines, t-bombs,
spare parts), and missiles (type, reloads, etc.).
The [supplies] screen also allows you to trade in one of your
ships, and to rename one of your existing ships. Note that trade-
in price on a ship is MUCH lower than what you paid for it in the
first place.
The [shipyard] screen takes you to ship availability list for
your empire, where you can spend your prestige points on a new
ship. (Don't forget to buy supplies once you got the ship!)
The [medals] screen shows your current rank insignia and your
medals, if any. You win medals by completing those special
missions you received.
If you ever want to go back to the map, click on the [map] button
again.
To move into a new hex surrounded your hex, just click on it.
After a short calculation, you'll move into that hex.
12.3 PICKING A MISSION AND FIGHT THE BATTLE
Look in the [mission] screen and see if there's a mission.
When you click [accept], on the mission, you get the briefing
screen.
Read the briefing text and look at the icons in the little
picture. Often, that gives more warning on what the mission is
like than the briefing text itself.
Click on [continue] to enter the mission.
For notes on what missions are easy, please see 13
You can forfeit a battle by hitting ESC and select [Forfeit
Mission]. You will have to pay a penalty, of course.
When you have finished the battle, you will exit back to the
"map" screen.
12.4 REFIT AFTER A BATTLE
Remember to repair damage (if any) and buy new supplies after
each mission. You don't need the maximum on each one, but having
them can be useful in certain situations.
12.5 BUYING NEW SHIPS
When you have saved up enough points, it's time to buy a new
ship. Buy a new ship at the shipyard screen of a type you want,
then either keep or trade in your existing ship. Buy some more
supplies. Now you are ready for bigger challenges!
13 Ten Tips for your Dynaverse Campaign
The following tips apply in both single-player and Dynaverse
campaigns.
13.1 START SMALL AND EASY
Do NOT overextend. You may be tempted to switch to a bigger ride
ASAP, which would be a DD. Don't do it. Save your prestige. You
take a 50% loss trading in ships, so you should do it as few
times as possible. You want to jump to CL or CA directly. See
[4.7].
You also need medium speed drones when they become available.
Slow drones are just too slow.
13.2 START MISSILES/DRONES
Easiest way to get started is with a missile-using race like
Mirak or maybe even the Federation. You can launch missiles while
yourself get away or stay away from enemy damage. Tricks like
anchor and scatter-pack can allow you to kill larger prey.
However, the reloads cost a lot of prestige points. So your
progress may be slower than if you take a direct-fire race.
Still, the ability to get away can be quite useful.
Try to fight enemies that do NOT use drone defenses, like
Romulans, Gorns, ISC, and maybe Orions.
13.3 STAY INTERIOR
Stay in the interior of your empire until you have 1-2 decent
large ships. The interior are usually only menaced by light enemy
raiding units or pirates. You shouldn't see heavier units, and
having 2 CL's or CA's should be quite sufficient to defeat most
threats.
If you stay at the interior you are also more likely to find
friendly ships about, and having friendlies in a mission is
always a big help. Remember to "zoom in" to see friendlies about.
Only venture out to the borders when you are ready in big ships.
And even then, look for friendlies nearby.
13.4 STAY ALIVE
Stay alive by checking your enemies and determine quickly "do you
have ANY chance of destroying the enemy." If you are a frigate up
against a battlecruiser, it's time to run.
See 7.4 for a quick way to calculate your odds of success.
A ship, esp. when you get to cruiser or bigger ships, is a major
investment. A BCH costs around 2500 prestige pts. A good CA costs
around 2000. A BB costs over 7000 prestige pts. At only about 200-
400 pt per mission, it takes a LONG time to build up those pts.
Therefore, it is ALWAYS better to run away and live to fight
another day.
13.5 STAY SUPPLIED
Keep going back to a base or planet to keep yourself supplied,
esp. if you use missiles. It's bad when you're required to fight
a battle with empty missile launchers or no mines, or worse, no
marines to defend yourself.
13.6 STAY POSITIVE
Positive in terms of prestige pts, that is. You need to always
keep a reserve of 200+ pts around, more if you use a lot of
drones/missiles.
If you fail a mission, you may need that reserve just to repair
and buy reloads. Some missions also have a penalty if you do
really badly.
13.7 TRADE UP IN BIG STEPS
Your vessel's trade-in value is like HALF of what you paid for
it. So it's bad economic sense to trade up in small steps, like
FF to DD to CL to CA to BC, and so on. Instead, trade up in BIG
steps like FF to CL to BC and you can save a lot of prestige
points.
13.8 DON'T BUY A SECOND (OR THIRD) SHIP JUST YET
If you are a missile user (Mirak, Fed drone-ship, etc.) you
should consider NOT buying a second ship. If you do, make your
second ship a REGULAR, not a drone variant. If you have two to
three ships all firing drones, you can actually spend MORE
prestige pts on missiles than what you can earn per mission, esp.
if you go for those "fast" drones!
Instead, upgrade your own ship to what you want (BCH is good),
THEN if you have a lot of pts left over, THEN make your own
fleet.
The optimum number of ships is 2 (not 3) if you are a fighter-
heavy or drone-heavy race. Three ships just require too many
reloads.
13.9 PICK THE EASY MISSIONS
Some missions are hard, while others are very easy. Monster
missions are the easiest (in general). Other missions can be
difficult or easy depending on your firepower. See 13 for
specific mission advice.
Don't forget to use the "zoom level" on the strategic map to
determine if you are likely to see any help in the scenario. At
the highest zoom level, you can see if there are known enemy and
friendly ships in the same hex or nearby hexes. Many of them will
join you in your battle. Obviously, the more help you have, the
easier the mission is.
13.10 EARN THE EXTRA PTS
Every ship you capture is worth extra pts. If you have a clear
superiority and a lot of transporters (multiple ships in your
fleet), captures can yield extra pts.
Some scenario have items you can recover for extra pts.
Convoy escort missions yields bonus prestige if you save all the
freighters and esp. if you capture the enemy raiders.
Stardock defense missions yields bonus prestige, esp. if you
capture the enemy ship(s).
14 Specific Mission Types
Here are some hints and tips for the generic mission types.
14.1 PATROL
Patrol is worth about 250 pts, depending on friendly and enemy
ships in the battle.
Probably the most common mission type, basically you show up at
one corner of sector while some other ship show up in the
opposite corner. You see the other ship(s) either right away or
in a minute or so.
You can retreat if you need to. No penalties if you do.
There are actually THREE variations of this... They are all
called patrol, but 3 different scripts are called regular (6?),
asteroid (10?), and Enigma. You can tell which is which by
looking at that little "icon map" at the mission briefing.
Regular just has red vs. green triangle. Asteroid is same except
for rocks dotting the map. Enigma has a "frazzled ship" icon
between the green and red triangle.
Enigma goes like this: you start on one side of map. In the
middle of the map is a derelict ship (or any race), no shields,
90% damaged. On the opposite side of the map is an enemy ship.
The derelict ship may have an item you can transport off for
bonus prestige. The other ship (and even your other AI ship) will
destroy the derelict ASAP.
There are up to three groups of enemies in a V- formation. One or
more of the group may be monster(s). There can be up to 3 other
groups of friendlies.
Best outcome is for you to capture one or more of the enemy
ships.
Advice: pick the easy battles here. If the enemy is nicely
matched, retreat and find easier picking.
14.2 DEEP SPACE ENCOUNTER
Deep space encounter is worth about 250, depending on enemy and
friendly ships in the battle.
Virtually same as patrol, except you don't see the enemy ship(s)
right away, as they are further into the corner of the map.
You can retreat if you need to. No penalties if you do.
Best outcome is for you to capture one or more of the enemy
ships.
Advice: pick the easy battles here. If the enemy is nicely
matched, retreat and find easier picking.
14.3 SCOUT / DEFEND
Scout is worth about 250 pts if you succeed in scanning all the
ships and disengage.
As attacker: scout means you need to get within 10 kk of each
enemy ship(s). Scan each enemy ship using "deep scan", and
disengage. You get very little pts for this though.
Best outcome is if you capture all the ships you scout AFTER you
scout them.
As defender: capture the scout if you can. It must not scan your
ships and get away. [Can any one find this mission?]
14.4 SCAN / DEFEND
Scan is worth only about 20 pts if you do scan only.
As scanner: you need to scan a planet. Another enemy ship is also
there in the system and may interfere. You can scan the planet
and leave (get 20 pt) or destroy/capture the enemy ship, THEN
scan the planet (get a lot more).
As defender: prevent the planet from being scanned, or
capture/destroy the scanning ship [Any one seen this mission?]
14.5 AMBUSH! / AMBUSHEE
The points are almost the same as patrol, except the ambushee
gets 100 pt bonus, while ambushers get 100 pt penalty (rough
estimates).
As attacker: the enemy ship(s) are sitting ducks... Destroy them!
You are on one side of map, a friendly ship is on the other side,
and the enemy ship is in the middle, immobile. They will start
moving when you get close though. Plan for MAXIMUM violence when
you arrive. It's too soon for scatter-pack or plasma torpedoes to
have armed, so you have to use H&R raids and so on. Overrun the
enemy ship with everything armed and ready. Drop a mine just as
you go by.
You may be assigned to attack some ridiculous ships. Once, I was
a Fed frigate, and I was assigned to ambush a Klingon B-10
(battleship). The other friendly was also a frigate. Needless to
say, I'm "out of there".
As defender: you're starting from cold start with time delay in
the middle of the map, and enemy ships are coming in from 2
sides. Can you get away in time? You'll get a message about "It
is an ambush sir!"
First, increase speed to max. Then check which side's enemy ship
is weaker (so you can blow by them without getting shot to
pieces). Then approach that side. If both sides are equally bad,
split the difference (go perpendicular to both).
If the ambushers are so weak they are of no threat to you, then
blow them away or capture them, and get a huge prestige bonus
(400+ possible).
14.6 INFO RETRIEVAL / HOLDING ACTION
Info Retrieval is one of the easiest 150-300 pts you can make.
As attacker: You need to reach the listening station to retrieve
some info. Enemy ships may stop you. The listening station is
directly ahead. Up to 3 groups of enemy ships may come at you in
a delta formation. There are two ways to play this: retrieval
only, or battle first.
You can blow directly by them and just get the info if you just
go yellow alert, don't bother with weapons, and speed 31 with
energy to jamming and shield reinforcements.
If you think you have enough firepower with other friendly ships
around to wipe out the competition, then by all means do so. If
you capture/destroy the enemy ships you will gain much more
prestige points than information retrieval alone.
As defender: you need to prevent the enemy ship from retrieving
the data. Basically, that means doing everything you can,
including slapping a tractor beam on the guy. You can't let him
get within the retrieval distance. If he does get the data, you
can't let him disengage. [Any one seen this mission?]
14.7 CONVOY RAID/ESCORT
Convoy Raid can be worth 300 pts as a raider, 450 pts if escort.
Beware that if your convoy is destroyed (or even mostly
destroyed) you can LOSE pts.
As the attacker, you need to destroy as many as the freighters as
possible and get away. Best is if you destroy all five
freighters, AND capture the enemy escort. On the other hand, as
long as you blow up the freighters you should be fine.
The freighters only move at speed 10, and will NOT maneuver
unless you drop a T-bomb in their path.
Your starting position is randomly chosen from 3 spots. If you
start in a tail chase, you better hurry up before those
freighters get away. In a battle with multiple escorts some of
the freighters can get away, though usually that takes a long
time.
You may slow the freighters down with a tractor beam. However,
some of those freighters can be decently armed.
In general, it's better to attack the front of the convoy first.
The damaged ship will fall out of formation (slowed to 6.5 or
less). Repeat until all freighters are slow, then you can blow
them up one at a time.
The best raider is a carrier. The PF/fighters can attack one
freighter while you go after another. You will kill them faster
and get away faster. Second easiest is with cruisers. Cruisers
have the combination of speed and firepower. Destroyers and below
don't have enough "crunch power" to blow up freighters in a
single pass.
One way to blow up the freighters is to capture it with marines.
As freighters don't have that many marines to start with, you
just need to knock down the shields and beam onboard 2-4 marines.
The ship will self-destruct when captured, thus count as
"destroyed". On the other hand, marines are pretty expensive.
As the defender, you need to prevent your freighters from being
destroyed. Best outcome is none destroyed, AND you captured the
enemy raider(s).
If enemy launchers fighters, go after them first. They can kill
your convoy while you are still trying to deal with the carrier.
Most carriers don't have enough firepower to kill a freighter
quickly any way.
The freighters don't have much firepower, even if you get armed
freighters or Q-ships.
If you are outmatched, grab one of the freighters with tractor
and SHOVE it off the map. At least you've saved one of them.
You may be able to distract the enemy attackers by flying
extremely fast (say, speed 30) and just fly near them to distract
them. Combine this with yellow alert (no weapons), EM, and ECM,
you may be able to "pull" the enemy raiders to you without firing
a single shot and buy enough time for the convoy to get away.
This is your ONLY chance if you are seriously outmatched.
The enemy must come to you, so use the extra power for overloads.
After that, switch to normal load as you need the speed to chase
the enemy down.
Enemy can come from three separate directions. Handle the closer
threat and don't get too far.
Monsters may occasionally join a convoy raid.
14.8 SHIPYARD ASSAULT/DEFENSE
Shipyard Assault can be worth 300 pts as attacker, 450 pts for
defender.
As the attacker, you need to destroy 3 stardocks, which have
shields and tractor beams. In your way are one or more enemy
ships (up to 3 groups).
Kill enemy ships first. It takes a LONG time to kill a stardock.
The stardocks have 5-10 tractor beams each so you can't really
destroy a stardock with drones unless you have a LOT of them.
They also have too many boarding parties to be captured easily.
As they don't fire back, just orbit them and keep firing into the
downed shield(s).
If you DO have enough marines to capture stardocks, you get extra
pts.
As the stardocks don't move, transporter bombs are useless.
As the defender, you need to destroy all the attackers. The
attackers will be coming after you. Force all of them to retreat
or destroy all of them before you are destroyed.
Concentrate on one attacker at a time. Stardocks take a while to
die so you have time. The hard part is judging when are you
outmatched. Follow friendlies and attack the same target to kill
one quickly.
Monsters may occasionally join shipyard assault.
14.9 STARBASE ASSAULT/DEFENSE
Starbase assault can be worth 400 pts as an attacker, 300 pts if
defender (?).
As the attacker, you need to destroy the base. A starbase is VERY
heavily armed with long-range weapons. You can't go in piece-meal
or you'll be wiped out one at a time.
Kill the defenders away from the base so you don't get hit on
multiple sides. Starbase have those extremely long-range ph-4s
that can hit you from range of 100. Start very slow and let the
defending ships come to you. Destroy the defenders, then follow
the friendly ships in.
If you use drones, arm a LOT of scatter-packs. Base does have
tractor beams, but if you have multiple ships all firing drones
you can overwhelm a base.
Do the "oblique pass" on the base, reinforce facing shields, and
circle the base. Start popping out the scatter-packs, try to go
for ONE specific shield (the one that got hit in the initial
pass). The base will be rotating so you can just wait for the
down shield to come back around. If you or one of your ships get
hammered, do a 180, circle the base the other way, and let the
other side take the heat for a while.
Starbase assault can be very difficult and costly. The starbase
has you outgunned at every turn. Your only hope is to concentrate
your firepower upon one shield and overwhelm.
As the defender, you need to destroy all the attackers. The
attackers will be coming after you. [Any one got this mission?]
14.10 PLANETARY ASSAULT / HOMEWORLD ASSAULT
Blast all the defenders to kingdom come, then capture the planet.
Some planets can be armed with ph-4s.
Planet has 20 boarding parties. You can damage the planet a bit
to kill off some of those defenders. When you think you've done
enough, start beaming down marines, use assault shuttles if you
need to. Get as many of them down there as possible in one
stroke.
Don't run into the planet! [Rare mission unless you attack a
sector with a planet]
14.11 MONSTER
Destroy the monster(s) ravaging the sector.
The difference mainly is in what type of monster it is. Some
monsters are tougher than others. There are 18 different types of
monsters, divided into 6 "breeds" (AM, DM, LC, MT, SG, SS) of 3
sizes (S,M,L) each.
Most monsters are vulnerable to seeking weapons and esp. drones
and scatter packs. Most simply don't move very fast to dodge
seeking weapons. The fast one (SS) doesn't do much damage.
For more details, please see Monsters section [28].
14.12 STARBASE CONSTRUCTION
This is an unusual mission. If you "bought" a starbase with a ton
of prestige points, you can bring it with you into enemy
territory. Then you get to plant that starbase somewhere. When
you do, you play this mission... Enemy ships come to prevent you
from building the base. If you win, the base is built. If not,
you lose that base.
Basically, this means you need to protect that special freighter
that contains the "skeleton" of your base from all enemy
attackers.
15 Special Missions
All special missions are listed here, no matter who they belong
to. If any are only for a specific race it will be noted.
This list is NOT complete yet. I am working on it. :-)
Thanks to 3dot14/j.li for his contribution to the Mirak special
missions. Visit Starfleet Universe at
http://www.strategyplanet.com/sfc/, THE site for SFC stuff.
15.1 PEACE IN OUR TIMES (GALACTIC POWER)
Difficulty rating: 5?
This is the FIRST special mission you run into. You only get this
while you own a frigate.
You're being sent to transport a diplomat to Organia. Four
neighboring races are asked each to send only a frigate. No
shooting unless others shoot first.
Q: What do I do when I get there?
A: Run for the planet, beam the diplomat down when you get to
transporter range (4.99).
Q: Does it matter who gets there first?
A: Don't believe so.
Q: Then what?
A: The ISC and Organian arrive, should be 1 CL and 1 DD. ISC
ships demand your surrender. Hail the other 3 ships and see what
they say about the situation. They should fight the ISC. Follow
them in. Try to kill the CL first as it has heavier torpedoes.
When you get there, you find Organia in the middle, and the 4
other frigates at the 4 compass directions. It doesn't matter who
gets there first, no pts for being first, but feel free to race
everybody there.
When you get there, get into transporter range (5.99 or less) and
beam down the diplomat (go to your transporter menu and you'll
see an extra icon there).
When you do that, the Organian 'vessel" arrive (a blob of light),
along with 2 ISC ships, a CL and a FF. The Organian delivers a
speech about how his lesson of peace has failed, and the ISC will
help bring "reason". Then ISC ship demands all four of you to
surrender at once.
Hail the other 3 ships that came with you one at a time. (Target,
then choose Comm panel, and hit the HAIL button). They should
agree that they hate the ISC more than they hate each other and
you. You can also hail the ISC, who will demand that you shut
down and surrender. You can surrender if that makes you feel
better.
The ISC should start shooting when everyone ignores the surrender
request. Fight's on. Blow up or capture (unlikely) the ISC ships.
With 4 ships you should be able to overwhelm the ISC ships. Don't
be first. Let someone else soak up those torpedoes. Keep your
speed up and avoid the plasma torpedoes. Take both ISC ships out
and you win.
15.2 PEACE IN OUR TIMES (ISC)
Organians has asked us to go on a pacification mission. The Gorn
and Romulans are not impressive. The Feds may deserve some
respect, try to negotiate with them. Then kill a ship and
convince the others to surrender. If not, destroy them.
This is best tackled in a CL.
Q: What do I do when I get there?
A: After the Organian gave the speech, find the Fed frigate and
offer truce.
Q: The Fed frigate didn't accept the truce. What should I offer
him?
A: Peace.
Q: The other ships won't accept truce.
A: Then they are indeed the savages you've been lead to believe.
Educate them.
When you get there, Organia is nearby, and the 4 galactic
frigates are flying around. The composition would be random.
Organian should be giving a speech. When he finished, you demand
all ships stand down and be boarded.
Locate the Fed frigate and go to comm, then offer truce. When
given a choice of "offer power" vs. "offer peace", offer peace,
then peace again. The Fed frigate should disengage.
You can try offering peace to the other three frigates, but they
won't take it. So it's time to show them the error of their
ways... Capture/destroy all of them to end the mission.
15.3 PROMISES TO KEEP (GALACTIC POWERS)
Difficulty rating: 8
ISC has set a blockade on a planet with a plague outbreak. You
must break the blockade, beam down medicine and personnel, and
beam up wounded. However, there is a catch... ISC has placed
mines all over the place, and cannot be avoided. The scientists
have came up with a way to neutralize the minefield, but the
neutralizer only fits on a freighter, and its range is only 15.
If you get outside that limit, you go BOOM. If the freighter goes
boom, you go boom.
ISC has ship(s) in the system, and a defense platform. The
freighter that laid the mines is also in orbit. Get detailed scan
on the platform and the freighter for bonus rewards. Destroy the
defense platform if you can.
Q: How should I start?
A: Try tractoring the freighter and let it drag you.
Q: How about those police ships?
A: Take them out or capture them (better).
Q: I can't get close to the planet!
A: Follow the almost same direction as the freighter but toward
the planet, at a HIGHER speed. You need to get within range 5 to
beam items down and up.
You start right next to the freighter. You should immediately
slap a tractor on it. In fact, set your speed to zero. Use all
your power for shield reinforcements, jamming, and weapons. Then
use tractor rotation to put the freighter behind you. Let it
"push/drag" you to the planet.
If you are in a frigate, you'll probably see 1 ISC police
corvette coming for you, another corvette behind the planet and
coming. Capture them if you can. They only have 2 boarding
parties each. Beat down one of the shields and it should be easy.
They will probably go for the freighter first so you should be
okay. Use tractor rotation to keep you between them and the
freighter. Remember, if the freighter goes boom, so do you!
When the freighter reached the planet, it will continue to the
defense platform.
If you have a captured ship, this is then easy. ISC ships are
immune to the minefield, so they can go anywhere. Get the
medicine and personnel onboard the captured ship, go to the
planet, beam down, beam up the "wounded" and "Harry Mudd", and
primary mission is accomplished.
If you don't have a captured ship, you have to be very careful.
Increase speed to slightly exceed the freighter's speed (15) and
drop off the tractor, then move close to the planet without
exceeding the range 15 circle. When you've got all the beaming
done, head back to the freighter and get on the tractor again.
Make sure the freighter is heading to the defense platform.
Target the freighter, then to go the comm panel and do "set
course", then select defense platform.
Now you need to scan the defense platform, but that's simple
enough. Just engage deep scan, max reinforce front shield and
jamming, and get in there. After you got the scan, blow it up.
ISC defense platforms have 4 ph-2, 4 ph-3, and 1 or 2 plas-F. So
watch out for torpedo. If you armed a scatter-pack, use it now.
Also send your captured ships in. Those ISC police corvettes have
plas-Fs too.
After you took care of the defense platform, you need to scan the
mine-laying freighter. Hail your own freighter again and have it
set course for the freighter. Engage your deep scan again. The
enemy freighter will attempt to move out, but you can catch up to
it. After you scan it, feel free to capture it for extra points.
It has 4 boarding parties, so you'll need a little help from
those boarding parties you sent to those two ISC ships.
After you captured the enemy freighter, the mission should end,
or you can disengage by hailing your freighter and click the
disengage command. You then wait until it leaves the limit of the
map.
15.4 PROMISES TO KEEP (ISC)
Difficulty rating: 5
The ______ is trying to break one of our micro-mine blockades
around system ______. Find out how they do it and prevent them
from getting through to the system.
Q: What do I do when I start?
A: Just wait, the enemy must come to you. Charge regular weapons
(not enveloping). Arm some suicide shuttles while you're at it.
Q: What do I do when I see the enemy ships?
A: Scan the freighter, as suggested.
Q: Then what?
A: Blow it up, of course! Then watch "hand of god" take out the
warships.
The enemy is roughly double you. If you are a CL, the enemy would
be two CL's. Though once I played I got 2 Romulan Snipes
(frigates) against my CLY.
When you start, you don't see any target, and the planet is
directly behind you. Start forward slowly and charge weapons.
Start charging your scanners when you reach range 50 of the
freighter and the 2 warships. Then fly down one side of the
freighter. That should explain that the freighter is generating
some sort of a field that is disabling the freighters.
Fortunately, the range is not that far.
So get away from the two warships, then make a quick pass on the
freighter, and blow it up in ONE pass (use everything, alpha
strike, overload, AND T-bombs.) After that, the enemy ships
wouldn't survive for another 5-10 seconds.
15.5 NO IRON BARS THE CAGE (GALACTIC POWERS)
Difficulty factor: 6
The ISC has "arrested" the governor and staff of one of our
colonies for resisting ISC pacification. The hostages are being
shipped off to another planet. Capture the transports, destroy or
capture its escorts, and destroy any ISC units you encounter.
Note: depending on the race, you may be requested to destroy the
freighters instead of capturing them. However, capture should
yield more points.
Q: Should I capture or kill the freighters?
A: Go for capture. You get more points. You probably don't have
enough to capture all four ships, so just destroy the escorts and
capture the freighters.
Q: How much time do I have?
A: Do it as fast as possible, as those defense platforms can do
you some harm if you get close.
You start near the edge of the map. You are in this little
"enclosure" of asteroids (see your tactical map). Off to your
right is the planet with 2 def-sats in orbit. Start heading out
and turn slightly left.
After a little while, you should see two ISC ships. If you are in
a frigate, those are probably 2 police ships. The enemy is
probably scaled to be two ships one class smaller than your ship,
along with two freighters moving at speed 7.
From there on, it should be a standard fight. Kill or capture
both escorts. You can use the firepower they provide, so try for
capture. Then use their help to capture both freighters by
beating down the shields on each and beam onboard enough to
capture. Each has 4 boarding parties. One carries the "hostages"
while the other contains some supplies. You don't know which is
which until you capture one of them.
When you have captured both, they will change course out of the
system. If they have gotten close to the def-sats, the def-sats
may fire on them or your ships. Feel free to engage, but it's not
required.
When the two freighters leave the map, the mission is over.
15.6 NO IRON BARS THE CAGE (ISC)
We have "arrested" some terrorists and are taking them to trial.
We know there will be a rescue attempt. Defeat the rescue attempt
and ensure the convoy arrives safely. You get a cruiser as
reinforcement.
Q: What do I do when I start?
A: Follow the freighters. One is the prison ship, the other is a
supply ship.
Q: How many enemies would I see?
A: Approximately 3 destroyers if you have a CL. Remember you get
a CA as a "helper".
You start next to the CA and 2 freighters, from edge of map,
heading toward the planet. The freighters are only going speed 7.
Charge weapons and get ahead of it slightly. You should see the 3
enemy ships soon.
When the ships appear, you'll see 2 groups coming toward you, and
one ship splitting off to the planet (which has 2 def sats in
orbit). Your friendly CA will engage the closer group. Feel free
to help him, but don't let the freighters get too far away.
Remember that third ship ahead.
Once you blew up or capture everybody, you got the secondary
objective. When the prison ship reaches the planet the primary
objective has been achieved.
15.7 THE GRIM RESOLVE (GALACTIC POWERS)
Difficulty rating: 5-8
The difficulty rating depends on what ship(s) you got. If you
have a cruiser or two, this is like 5. Otherwise this can be
quite difficult.
You have three objectives... 1) Destroy the shipyard, 2) Send
down an infiltration team and retrieve info from the ISC base on
the planet, and 3) destroy Captain Marinus, the ISC "ace".
Some races require you the do the infiltration mission, others
don't.
You do get some help though. A captured ISC freighter loaded with
antimatter will fly into the middle of their shipyard and be
detonated. That should take out most of the stardocks. You need
to destroy the rest. You will control the detonation.
Q: What should I do with the freighter?
A: There's only one command: detonate, so just leave it. It'll
head toward the shipyard and stop when it gets close enough.
Q: Where's Marinus?
A: After you take out the first defending ship, he'll show up
from the planet.
Q: When should I blow up the freighter?
A: When it's in the middle of the shipyard, of course! (use the
tactical map)
You start on the edge of the map. The freighter is just ahead of
you and moving in. To your left should be a POLW approaching.
Target the freighter and set "remember target" to one of the 4
target keys.
Capture or destroy the POLW.
When the POLW is disposed of, a CL (Marinus) should approach from
the planet. While you approach the CL the freighter should reach
the shipyard. Use the tactical map to be sure. Just remain out of
range 30. When the freighter is in the middle of the mess, target
it (use the hotkey) and send the detonation command. 3 of the 4
stardocks should blow up.
Now take care of Marinus, then capture or destroy the remaining
stardock to end the mission.
15.8 THE GRIM RESOLVE (ISC)
You need to protect this shipyard. There should only be unmanned
freighters around. Some enemy ships may be nearby. Be prepared
for anything.
Q: What do I do?
A: Deep-Scan all the freighters inbound.
You start near the planet. You can see this shipyard with 4
stardocks. There are 3 freighters on the scopes.
Pick the closest one and set MAX SPEED to it, and deep scan it
when you're in range. Then move onto the next one. Repeat. One of
them should be full of anti-matter. Destroy that one.
When you do that, the enemy ships show up, should be relatively
light, a CL and a DD. Capture of kill them as you see fit.
After you take care of them, another pair show up. Repeat until
all enemy ships are destroyed.
15.9 J'ACCUSE (GALACTIC POWERS)
Difficulty rating: 6-8
The difficulty rating depends on your ship size(s). If you have
destroyers, you can have trouble here. If you have two cruisers,
this should be a piece of cake.
You have been ordered to approach an ISC planet with a ship of an
opposing empire. Together, you will challenge the ISC. Destroy
all ISC defenders.
Recommend you save the game BEFORE this starts.
Q: What do I do when my "friendly" starts attacking me?
A: Do NOT fire back. Hail him and "reinforce alliance". You may
need to do this more than once.
Q: My "other" ship fired on the friendly and he got mad!
A: When the mission starts, order weapons tight. If he already
fired, it's too late. Restart the mission.
Q: How do I hail Organia? There's some sort of jamming!
A: Destroy the def-sats in orbit first.
You start range 300 or further away from the planet and the
ships. Your "friendly" is a BCH of an opposing race.
As you approach, the ISC hail both of you. They claim that they
have a fleet above one of your worlds. Unless you two fight each
other and demonstrate your aggressive nature, a world will be
destroyed. The winner's world will be spared.
If you have more than one ship, make sure you are on "weapons
tight" BEFORE you target the "friendly" to "reinforce alliance".
If you don't, your other ship will accidentally fire on the
"friendly", thus turning that into an enemy ship. That ex-
friendly ship will be very annoyed and shoot you. He'll also stop
and you will continue alone. This makes fight against the ISC
very difficult, so don't do that.
If you have hailed the friendly and the alliance is reinforced,
he MAY still shoot at you later. The ISC will hail again with the
threat. Just reinforce the alliance AGAIN. Take the hit and
ignore it. Weapons-tight until you reach the ISC perimeter.
When you get close to the ISC ships, the allied captain should
say something like "I'm tired of these ISC meddlers. Let's
attack!" From there on, he won't turn on you, so change tactic
to fire at will, and start attacking.
You'll see the planet, along with two defense platforms, and 2
DDLZs and 1 FFL and 1 FFLG. Destroy or capture all of them.
Strangely, they never exceeded speed 7, so taking them is easy.
One of them is an FFLG (commando frigate leader) and has a lot of
marines (24 vs 6-8 on other ships). Just destroy that one.
When you destroy the defense platforms, the jamming clears.
Hail Organia (comm panel, target planet, select HAIL), and you'll
get some dialog going. Apparently Organians have some plans, and
ISC is merely a part of it. Apparently they are preparing us for
some other threat...
15.10 J'ACCUSE (ISC)
You must defend Organia against intruders. They wish to disturb
the Organians in their peaceful contemplation. Do not allow that.
We have planted agents on each of the enemy ships. They will be
able to perform a random sabotage. Use them wisely, as they are
bound to discover the ruse soon. Protect the two defense
satellite jammers in orbit at all costs.
Q: What does "create dissension" do?
A: The enemy ship will turn in a random direction.
You start near the planet with two defense satellites. Head
"west". Reinforce front shields as you are in a dust field.
Consider charge enveloping torpedoes and/or suicide shuttles.
You should see two enemy fleets, probably twos groups of 1
cruiser, 1 destroyer, and 1 frigate each. (I got Klingons and
Lyrans, who are allies?) Destroy or capture all of them.
You are outnumbered, but you have the saboteurs to help. The
sabotage you can do to each is random. The most useful is
"sabotage shields", which drops the shields outright. Against
plasma torps, it's DEVASTATING. Even better, use enveloping
plasma, which causes DOUBLE damage. "Disable weapons" is not bad,
as that basically gives you more time to kill it. Same with
"sabotage engines". "Create dissension" is not that useful.
Go after the FRONT shield of enemy ships as they need it to bull
through dust clouds. Without it they need to go very slow or
they'll take damage.
If you get "sabotage shields", use it JUST before you launch your
alpha strike. Don't forget mines, suicide shuttles, and maybe
other goodies.
Consider sabotage one ship's engines early on so you can spread
out the formation and be able to kill one ship at a time without
them ganging up on you.
Consider downloading the torpedoes after you fire off the first
salvo so you can get more firepower out there faster. Capture is
an option if you have done enough damage to the defending ships.
15.11 DIPLOMATIC IMMUNITY (GALACTIC POWERS)
Three other races have sent delegations to a peace conference on
a starbase on how to deal with the ISC... Except an ISC sabotage
team got there first. All three ships have been disabled, and the
Starbase weapons are not working either.
You have an engineering team and a rescue party onboard. Use the
engineering team to get the 3 ships working (one at a time), then
send the rescue party onboard the starbase. Beam them back, then
use the engineering team to rig self-destruct on the starbase.
Destroy the base, and disengage.
Q: How do I repair a friendly ship?
A: Target the ship. When you reach transporter range, emergency
stop, hail it to drop shields, beam engineering team over. When
the team reports repair complete, order "drop shields" again, and
beam them back.
Q: How do I save the delegates?
A: Order starbase to drop shields. Beam in the evac team
(marines). When they're done, beam them back.
Q: How do I rig the starbase for destruction?
A: When you got the delegates, beam in the engineering team. Beam
them back when they're done. Then you should get a "detonate"
command when you communicate with the starbase.
Q: The starbase won't detonate!
A: Try multiple times. You may have to be within range 10 or
less.
Q: Now what?
A: You can leave after you blow up the starbase and retrieved the
delegates.
This one is not that hard if you hurry a bit. The 3 ships are in
an mirrored L-shape formation. Pick the closest one, aim at it,
and go maximum speed. Start arming scatter-packs ASAP. When you
get to range 10, go to Comm panel and tell the ship to drop
shields. When you reach 5.99, beam the engineering team (not the
marines!) onboard, and hit emergency stop. Turn the ship so you
face the next ship, and set speed 5. When your ship start moving
again, the repair should be done or almost. Instruct the ship to
drop shields again and beam the engineering team back. Head for
next ship.
Repeat the same steps at the other two ships.
When all three ships are done, the ISC should be arriving. There
should be 4 ships, a CA, a CL, and 2 DDs. Head to the starbase,
tell it to drop shields, and beam the marines onboard. When the
marines say they're ready to beam back, order shields dropped
again, then beam back the marines, beam in the engineering party,
and wait.
The 3 ships you helped repair should keep the ISC busy, but they
may not last very long under the plasma torpedoes. The three
cruisers will engage the ISC separately and probably be destroyed
one by one. Feel free to shoot at a few targets and pop a few
scatter-packs to help out, but your objective is to destroy the
starbase after rescuing the delegates.
When the engineering party reports ready, beam them back (drop
shields again), move away a bit (range 10), target the starbase,
then go to Comm and try "send destruct". It may take many
attempts, but the starbase should go boom.
After that, you can just disengage, or you can try killing ISC
ships if you can.
15.12 DIPLOMATIC IMMUNITY (ISC)
The galactic powers are trying to unite against us. Our agents
detonated a neutrino bomb and disabled the 3 ships and the
starbase. Destroy those 3 ships, and capture the starbase, and
deal with any reinforcements.
Q: Should I destroy the ships or capture them?
A: You are asked to DESTROY them, so show no mercy.
Q: Should I destroy the ships first or go after the base first?
A: I go for the ships first. The base is pretty easy if you move
fast. Though you can do two ships first, then the base, then the
third ship.
Pretty straightforward mission... Blow up all three enemy ships
(you can take one out in the first pass). Then put enough marines
onboard the SB (10 marines) to capture it. Or you can take out
one or two ships, capture the base, THEN take out the other two
ships.
If you capture the SB, you get its weapons to help out, and it
has ph-4's, photons, AND a LOT of fast drones. So use it! Few
ships can withstand a full salvo of fast drones.
The enemy reinforcements include 3 ships, so head back to the
base and use it for cover and firepower. It shouldn't take long
to take out all attacking ships, esp. with the starbase's help.
15.13 INTERCEPTOR (EVERYONE EXCEPT ISC)
You need to intercept a freighter. It is carrying plans relating
to the ISC invasion. It uses a route no one uses... next to a
black hole. Capture the freighter, obtain the data onboard, then
dump the freighter into the black hole so ISC won't suspect your
involvement. After that, disengage.
Q: I'm taking damage by just moving!
A: Dust field does that. Reinforce front shields to max to
counteract the damage.
Q: How do I capture the data?
A: Capture the entire ship would suffice.
Q: How DO I drop the freighter into the black hole?
A: Tractor it, and release it as close to the black hole as you
can (say, range 10 or less).
You start on near the middle of the map... The freighter just
entered the map to your left. This occurs on a map with a dust
field all over and a blackhole in the middle of the map. You want
to catch the freighter as fast as possible, so set maximum speed,
and aim a bit ahead of the freighter (don't use follow, as that
takes more time). Go for speed 24 to 28. Set maximum
reinforcement to front shield to counteract the dust field
damage.
When you reach range 10, start slowing down to the same speed
(he's going 12) so you can stay within transporter range. Pound
down his rear shields, and beam in the marines. He has 6 marines
defending, so it'll take you more than one pass unless you have 2
or more ships. When you get the ship, the ship will stop. Slap a
tractor beam on the freighter. Start heading to the black hole.
You should get the notice that you found the data. Increase speed
to max. When the range reaches 10, disengage tractor and do max
left turn and get away from the black hole (use HET if you need
to).
Start heading for map's edge. The freighter should go in after a
little while. Exit the map, and you win!
15.14 RECLAMATION (ALL GALACTIC?)
The best person to stop the ISC ground invasion is a prisoner of
(something). You are being sent to retrieve the man any way you
can from the (something) base.
(If you're Klingon, this would be from another Klingon House. If
you're the Feds, this is probably from the Orions, and so on.)
Q: What do I do with the listening post?
A: Try DeepScan it, and follow the suggestions.
Q: What about the code?
A: Send it at range 50 or so. If you get too close, it's useless.
Q: How do I get the base? I keep getting blasted by those ph-4s!
A: You need 2 or more ships and assault shuttles. When you get
close enough, open fire to bring down a shield and capture the
base quickly.
Q: What about the patrols?
A: You can ignore them or capture them. It's up to you. If they
"stand down", don't shoot them or they'll start back up again.
When you start, there's a "listening post" near you. The base
station is about 135 beyond the listening post. There would be 2
or 3 VERY light ships around, depending on your fleet size. If
you have 1 CA /1 CL, the enemy fleet is 3 FF. If you have 1 CA,
enemy fleet is 2 POL.
Go to the listening post and do a deep scan. Your science officer
would suggest you beam a science team onboard. Use the
transporter to do so. After a while, you'll get reports of random
messages... About drunken officer thrown into brig, someone being
bored, Romulan ale ordered, etc. Eventually, you'll get the
access code to the station.
Now take your fleet and approach the station, set to weapons-
tight. Send the code at about range 50. The station will NOT fire
heavy weapons on you, but it WILL defend itself against scatter-
packs and such if you launch it too close. So start popping
scatter packs at range 15. Reinforce front shields to max.
When you get close enough, order all ships to capture, all ships
fire to beat down a shield, then rush in there to plant enough
boarding parties to take over the station. There are only 12
defenders, so you can do it in ONE pass if you have enough ships.
The base should be screaming "traitor!" and starting to fire on
your ships. Start rotating shields so those phaser-4s don't kill
any one. The station should be yours in a little while if you've
planted enough marines.
The defending ships should be attacking, but you should get a
message from the 'legend' that he can do something about it. So
hail the defending ships, they'll cease fire, and you win! With
the 100 bonus for using the listening post, you can get up to 550
on this mission.
The alternative way: stay away from the base station, and capture
as many of the defenders as you can. Then group them all
together, repair all items, arm scatter packs, and then ALL
charge for capture. With multiple ships you should be able to
capture the station. You get slightly less points this way, and
there is a danger of blowing up the station before you capture
it. However, the pts from capturing all those defenders helps a
little.
15.15 BLEEDING THE APES (ALL GALACTIC?)
You need to prevent ISC reinforcements to the ground battle.
Except this is NOT a convoy... This is a fleet.
Q: Which are the invasion ships?
A: There will be 2 CLGs (light commando cruiser) moving at speed
20, in addition to any escorts.
When you start, the planet is in front of you, and to the right
is the fleet. There will be 2 CLGs, which are the invasion ships.
The invasion ships will have other ships as escorts. The exact
composition will be identical to your fleet. If you have 1 CA/2
CL, the enemy will have the 1 CA and 2 CL. If you have 2 CA, the
enemy fleet will have 2 CA as escorts. If you bring a DN, they
will have a DN as well.
To reduce confusion, do NOT bring any war destroyers or light
cruisers. That way you know any CLs you see need to be destroyed.
The invasion ships are easy to spot... they move at speed 20, and
does NOT head toward you. They also have only phasers/PL-Fs and a
TON of boarding parties (30+). The invasion ships will peel off
if you attack them. So just do close passes and they won't go
toward the planet.
Try to get AROUND the escorts so the escorts can't protect the
invasion ships. Try to separate the two CLGs and kill each one
separately.
When playing as the Klingons, I can't win this one with cruisers.
I ran around a bit, finished enough missions so I was able to
trade up to a C8K with fast type-IV drones (there are 6 type B
launchers on a C8K). I armed all the scatter-packs, and damaged
the ISC DN so it can't chase me. Then I used my 6-missile
launchers to destroy both CLGs after softening their shields with
my other weapons. Then I used the scatter-packs on the DN.
15.16 BATTLE AT THE GRAVE OF THOUGHTS (GALACTIC)
The offensive against the ISC has begun. You will lead the attack
against one of the ISC "reeducation camps", which are 3 base
stations. Capture each one, call in a transport for each, which
will take off the prisoners.
You will get 2 other cruisers for this mission. The HQ has a
relay station in the sector, which has extra marines onboard that
you can use at the edge of the system. You can use the relay
station to call for further assistance. You can use the relay
station to request up to 8 other units. The HQ would really
appreciate it if you can lure enough of the enemy ships out so
you can destroy 10 of them.
Q: How do I get more marines?
A: Stop near that relay station and beam on some more. Do this
before the last freighter leaves so you don't need to spend
prestige points to replace those you used.
Q: What's with that Orion relay station?
A: That allows the ISC base stations to call for reinforcements.
Destroy it if you don't want to see reinforcements for their
side. However, you may fail the "destroy 10 ships" requirement if
you destroy the Orion relay station.
Q: Where do the ISC reinforcements come from?
A: Through that asteroid field you see on the map. If you want to
mine that corridor be my guest.
Q: Can I order multiple freighters to come in?
A: No. Only one will appear at one time. It must leave the map
before the other will arrive.
Q: The freighter arrived and is doing nothing!
A: You need to target it and order it to approach the station.
You start on the map edge. Right behind you is the friendly relay
station. In front of you are the 3 base stations in a triangular
formation (the tip pointing at you). You will probably only see
the one at the tip until you get closer. Behind the station seems
to be a LOT of asteroids. That's the ISC "holding zone", where
their reinforcements come from. There is also an Orion relay
station next to the asteroids. If the Orion listening post is
destroyed, ISC can't call for any further reinforcements (which
would prevent you from doing the secondary objective).
Move in SLOWLY and take your time. You don't need to capture a
base yet.
Your AI friendlies are over-eager and they will go after the 2
CM's that come out first. They simply go after the closest target
(except the base stations, those are considered "neutral"). If
you don't keep them away from the enemy relay, they will probably
destroy the relay and prevent you from meeting the secondary goal
of destroying ten ships.
Instead, you'll have to "manage" the AI by letting the AI ships
get killed. Do NOT help them. Let them fight with the 2 CMs while
you wait near the first base station you see. Those two CMs will
try to kill the AI cruisers. Let them get killed. When they come
after you, call for help and go back to your relay. Then when
your help arrive, stay near your relay and wipe out the ISC.
If you have two or more ships, use your marines to capture as
many ships as you can. Remember, you get a LOT of replacements
(30+) back at the relay station, so use them.
The next ISC group should come out then and by the time your
group gets there that other group should be in front of the
relay. Then keep blasting. When you've got ten, you can let the
AI friendlies destroy the enemy relay.
Then capture a base, call in the transport, order the transport
to "goto station", wait for transport to leave the map. Repeat
two more times, and you win!
15.17 BATTLE AT THE GRAVE OF THOUGHTS (ISC)
Difficulty rating: 8 (tough mission)
You are to defend the 3 base stations against the attackers, who
want to destroy the bases. If your ally ship(s) has been
destroyed, reinforcements should arrive. However, you also need
to destroy the enemy relay station at the edge of the sector to
prevent THEM from calling in THEIR reinforcements.
Q: Should I go after the relay or defend the stations?
A: Defend first. Try to drive the cruisers back. Engage them as
close to the relay as possible so you can "sneak" over and
destroy one.
You start in the middle of the bases. Head "west" immediately.
You need to catch the enemy ships before they reach your first
base station. Arm suicide shuttles as supplemental power.
The enemy task force is comprised of 2 heavy cruisers and 2 light
cruisers of a random galactic race. They go directly after your
base stations, which are NOT shielded and have NO weapons. You
need to slow down the enemy by shooting at them and get between
them and your bases. The enemy task force stays at about speed 10-
14, so it's not that hard to get in front of them.
You get a cruiser as ally. If it's destroyed, supposedly you get
more reinforcements. You can't call for reinforcements directly,
and mine never did arrive. They need to get their way out of the
asteroids, so they are REALLY slow.
If you can, destroy 3 ships and leave one damaged. THEN destroy
the relay station, THEN come back and destroy the last ship.
The allied cruiser SHOULD help keep that remaining enemy busy so
you CAN kill the relay station. Another possibility is to tractor
that last ship and DRAG it away from the stations.
Capture as many as you can. You can end up with a whole FLEET of
ships (10 or more). They help keep the enemy ships busy. However,
your job is the PREVENT the destruction of the base stations, NOT
to capture ships.
As long as you save ONE you win, but saving all three is the best
outcome.
15.18 DROPPING THE HAMMER (ALL GALACTIC?)
You are to attack an ISC planet being used as a forward base.
This should draw out the fleet. Destroy it, then capture/destroy
the planet.
Q: I don't see any enemy ships
A: Then take out the def sat at the planet.
Q: Done that. Now what?
A: Wait and prepare the welcome to the approaching enemy
cruisers.
Q: Got the cruisers. Now what?
A: Capture the planet, of course.
The planet is not armed. There is ONE def-sat in orbit.
Once you blew away the def-sat, the AI should pound the planet.
Just follow the AI closely as the 2 ISC cruisers will take a
while to get here. Save your missiles and scatter-packs for the
cruisers. You can't destroy the planet. Save the heavy stuff for
the cruisers.
Try hailing the planet and your allied units for some interesting
conversation.
Destroy both cruisers (you can try capture, but your allies will
probably blow them up first). Then capture the planet.
15.19 OPERATION TYR (ALL GALACTIC?)
The final attack on the ISC is on... You are to destroy the ISC
starbase. This will break their back, figuratively. Destroy all
defending ships as well. Use all your allies.
The ISC starbase is nicely armed and it has 3 def-sats covering
it as well. There should be five defending ships, though once I
only saw three.
Many ships will accompany you, total of 5 (or more if you brought
more than one).
You can hail each of your allies and give them targets.
Unconfirmed: You can also hail the ISC base or units and demand
surrender.
Just blow up the starbase. Then blow up all the defenders.
15.20 THE WAR CRIMINALS (ALL GALACTIC)
It's time to try the Organians in a war criminal court... A
special freighter has been equipped with a neutrino pulse
emitter, which should "imprison" the Organians. You are to lead
the task force to capture the Organians. When the freighter is
within range 15 of the planet, hail the planet with neutrino
pulse, then use the freighter to capture the Organians.
In front of you is Organia. In your way is the final ISC task
force.
If you can get the freighter there faster (within range 15), you
can beat the ISC there. You can even demand that the ISC
surrender.
The ISC have just destroyers and frigates by this time, with ONE
cruiser. My task force blew them to bits.
Then we approached the planet... Hailed, and the Organians came
onboard willingly. Didn't even have to use the freighter.
Thus ended the ISC Pacification War...
15.21 A THIEF IN THE NIGHT (ISC)
You have been ordered to stand guard at a base with some of our
freighters. Their crew has been delayed and we have word that
enemies may try to capture these unmanned freighters. You are to
protect these at all costs. They must NOT fall into enemy hands.
Destroy them if you must.
Q: How many enemies can I expect?
A: Usually 2 ships, a destroyer and a cruiser.
Q: Should I try to get those freighters out of these by beaming
over some marines?
A: That's one possible approach, esp. if your ship is relatively
small. However, beware that they may not be under your direct
control.
Q: I got the freighters. What can I do with them?
A: They will either head for one of the def sats, or follow you
like puppies. They won't disengage.
Q: The enemy has captured one of the freighters. What do I do?
A: Capture it back is a possibility. Else, destroy it.
You see an enemy destroyer in the middle of the map. Around it
are four freighters in a "cross" pattern and two def sats at 3
and 9 o'clock positions.
Charge weapons and get in there. You need to keep BOTH ships busy
so they don't try to capture the freighters.
In general, even in a CL you should be able to defeat both, but
you may get pretty banged up.
Try to heavily damage the DD in the first pass, maybe even
capture it, so the cruiser will waste its weapons on the captured
ship instead of you. Then you can pop the cruiser.
Try hailing the enemy ships for some interesting dialogue.
15.22 BOMBER MEN (ISC)
You have been ordered to escort this supply freighter to resupply
two of our asteroid bases, alpha and bravo. However, some enemy
presence is expected.
Q: What do I do when the bomb was discovered?
A: Slap a tractor on the freighter and PUSH it over to asteroid
Alpha ASAP. Don't RAM the freighter INTO the asteroid though.
Q: The freighter won't move to base bravo.
A: Use the comm panel to order the freighter to head to asteroid
base Bravo.
Q: How about that enemy ship that shows up later?
A: Take him out or capture it.
Q: Freighter has disengaged. Now what?
A: You need to leave the map as well.
When you start, the freighter reports it has a bomb onboard and
you have less than 3 minutes to get the freighter over to the
asteroid alpha base so the base can help defuse it. Slap a
tractor on the freighter and PUSH it toward base. You should
reach the base not too long after you received note that there is
about one minute left.
The enemy ship then heads in, sensing his trick has failed. Take
out that cruiser. Capture for more points.
Then a destroyer should show up. Take him out as well. Capture
for more points.
When the freighter has left the map, you should leave the map to
end the mission.
Try hailing the enemy ships for some interesting dialogue.
15.23 FOXTROT (ISC)
Qori, a famous ISC general, has "defected" to the ________. Four
other cruisers will blockade the system. NO ONE must leave the
system. If you can capture Qori's cruiser it would be even
better. Try to find out what did Qori traded to the Alliance
also.
Q: Where is Qori's cruiser?
A: He's running for the corner of the map. Go max speed and you
can catch him.
Q: How about enemy ships?
A: DeepScan any enemy ships you see. You need to find out what
Qori traded FOR. Maybe capture one of the enemy ships.
You start on the "eastern" edge of the map. Four other cruisers
are at compass positions around the system.
Charge at the system, max speed, column formation. Set to mode
capture. Load small torps as you don't have much power left. Some
enemy light cruisers are making a run for it, but you should be
able to catch them. Fly by, bring down a shield, and capture one.
Continue on.
You need to find Qori's ship ASAP. Maintain speed 31 and get
close to it, then DeepScan his ship as well without getting TOO
close. Other ships should be keeping it busy, so just keep
bringing down a shield and beam onboard marines while your scan
goes. After you got the results, go after other ships. Hit each
hard enough to slow it down so other cruisers can kill it.
When all enemy ships have been captured, destroyed, or have
escaped, you're done.
15.24 TEMPLE IN THE SKY (ISC)
A Federation scientist, Dr. Severin, claims he has a secret he
wishes to share with us. Undoubtably the Feds have heard him.
Intercept Dr. Severin's ship before the Feds do, get the secret
and see how well it works.
Red alert, speed 30, and charge all weapons, normal loads. Just
head straight "north" and you should see Dr. Severin's freighter
to the north, range 170+. Intercept it. Reinforce front shields
as you'll hit a dust cloud.
There's a pulsar to your right, ignore it.
Soon you'll see some Feds to your left, ignore them. Should be
two ships, depending on your tonnage. Could be CA/DD to BCH/CA.
They only move at speed 10 while you move at speed 30, so you
will catch Dr. Severin before they do, even if they're closer.
Feel free to toss a few torpedoes their way.
Try hailing Dr. Severin at range 50. He'll tell you to come
closer.
When you're point-blank, he'll send you the info. It's something
about first contact with a new specie.
I personally tractor the freighter and push him just off the map.
THEN I come back and deal with the Feds. Those guys only move at
speed 10, so I move behind them, slow down, and blow both out of
space or capture as you see fit.
Then head to the pulsar, stop at range 50. Try hailing the pulsar
multiple times... When you got a reply, you win.
15.25 THE FIRM HAND OF DIPLOMACY (ISC)
You are to escort our finest diplomat(s) in. Protect him/them at
all costs. Expect enemy interference. Destroy them. Scan the
planet while you're at it.
WARNING: Do NOT ask the same ship to surrender multiple times.
You MAY crash the game. Also, during battle I was able to get the
game to lock-up.
Q: I can't get to the freighter! He's moving too fast!
A: Shoot at him (yes, at a friendly). He'll start evading, and
you can get closer.
When you start, the freighter sends a distress call... Three
ships are after it. You see a planet to your right, and
freighter will appear to your left.
Turn left 30 degrees (approx.) and you'll see the freighter.
Intercept it. Don't tail chase it or you won't get into range, as
he's moving at speed 31, same as you probably. If you have to,
shoot him to have him evade so you can get closer. Then order it
to drop shields so you can beam the diplomat onboard.
Then it's a matter of taking out those three pesky meddlers. Two
of them are special commando ships. One Hydran, one Klingon.
There's also a Gorn cruiser with extra marines onboard.
If possible, follow the freighter around as it's a great target
and moving at maximum speed. However, if you move that fast you
won't have weapons armed at all. Switch to F-torps and go after
ONE ship at a time. Destroy all of them and you win.
You can order the enemy ships to surrender. Some will, others
will keep fighting. If the ship has surrendered, do NOT shoot at
him again or he'll start shooting again.
Or you can surrender yourself, but ISC is NOT the Federation, so
beware of the consequences.
Scan the planet may yield some surprises.
15.26 DESCRETION (MIRAK)
You are dispatched to guard a Mirak burial ground.
Q: What kind of enemy should I expect?
A: Ship or ships similar to your fleet level.
Q: What do I do with the incoming Lyran fleet?
A: Destroy the incoming Lyran ships before they reach the
Coffins. (Z-BOX)
Q: Is there anything I should do with the Coffins?
A: No. Your ONLY objective is to protect them.
15.27 DILITHIUM DANCE (MIRAK)
You are dispatched to recover cargo from a destroyed freighter
and rescue disabled allied ships near a pulsar, which can "burst"
any minute... There's a Lyran ship there as well...
Q: Where are the dilithium crystals?
A: DeepScan the boxes one by one. Your science officer will
notify you when you found one. Beware that the boxes that do NOT
contain dilithium act as mines and will explode if you get too
close.
Q: How do I beam the dilithium?
A: Target the box, and the dilithium icon in your Transporter
Panel. Then beam them onboard.
Q: How many dilithium crystals are there?
A: More than enough. :-)
Q: How do I transport the dilithium to allied ships?
A: Approach the allied ships. You may need to hail them to drop
shields. Then beam the dilithium and engineering team onboard.
When they said they started working, beam the team back and go
find another dilithium.
Q: What about the Lyran ship?
A: Ignore it, even if it powers up. Your other ships still have
phasers and shields.
Q: What about the Pulsar?
A: It will burst in roughly 15 to 17.5 minutes, game time. Watch
the clock on the top right carefully. When your science officer
says the star is destabilizing, go max speed and run for the map
edge.
You start on the map edge. There's a pulsar in the middle of the
map. You see this "glob" of various cargo boxes and beyond that,
three lighter Mirak ships, disabled, and beyond that, a Lyran
ship (cruiser?), also disabled.
Charge deep scanners and move in at max speed. You need to find
the 3 or more dilithium boxes among the ammo boxes. The ammo
boxes will explode if you get too close. You can tell the boxes
two ways... 1) by getting close enough (range 5?) and 2) by using
deep scan.
If you are in a REAL hurry, just max reinforce front shields and
plow through all the cargo boxes.
When you find the dilithium, beam one onboard, go to friendly
ship, beam it over. Repeat until all three ships are fixed.
The Lyran ship should power up when you got 2 ships repaired.
Ignore him and keep searching.
You better be done by minute 15. The pulsar will burst at minute
17 so you better be near map's edge by then.
15.28 TUG OF WAR (MIRAK)
You are to scan and recover a freighter. However, beware of
interference.
Q: How do I obtain ship's log?
A: Hail the freighter through Communications. Also DeepScan the
ship.
Q: I am outnumbered by Klingon and Lyran forces, what do I do?
A: Approach and tow the freighter off the map at maximum speed.
Do not fight the Lyran and Klingon ships. You don't have to
destroy both ships.
15.29 PLAYGROUND (MIRAK)
You are to investigate a star system.
Q: I am being hailed, but I don't see any messages from the
Monsters?
A: Use Comm Panel
Q: I am outnumbered by both of them?
A: Proceed to fight the monsters, but pay close attention to what
they say.
Q: How do I beam down the survey team?
A: Transporter Panel.
Q: Where do I beam them to?
A: Use you DeepScan to scan the objects (not the Monsters) on the
map.
15.30 WHAT'S SO FUNNY? PART I (MIRAK)
You are to pick up the ambassador.
Q: How do I find the ambassador?
A: DeepScan.
Q: How do I beam him up?
A: Transporter Panel.
15.31 WHAT'S SO FUNNY? PART II (MIRAK)
Be sure to save the game before this mission.
You are to escort the ambassador to the diplomatic conference.
Q: There are so many planets, How do I choose?
A: Hail all 5 planets, and just pick one. The choice has no
noticeable consequences. If you are unhappy with the outcome,
reload saved game to pick another choice.
15.32 THE WHEEL OF PAIN (MIRAK)
Be sure to save the game before this mission.
You are dispatched to investigate a freighter.
Q: How do I investigate the freighter?
A: Pay attention to your Comm Panel, and DeepScan the freighter.
Q: What is the Alien ship doing?
A: There will be another enemy vessel on the map. Hail it, but
don't fight it. If he has nothing to say, hail it against after
he opens fire.
Q: Yes or No?
A: when posed the question, use your best judgement. If it turns
out the wrong way, you can always reload the game. But be
prepared to fight some more ships after you answer.
Q: and the planet?
A: Bombard it to reduce its marine level, and capture it.
15.33 THE GATES OF HELL (MIRAK)
You are to investigate a star system.
Q: I am pinned down from both sides, help?
A: At the beginning of the mission, go to yellow alert and head
toward the planet at full speed. Do not be concerned with the
enemy ships. They will engage each other once you run through the
blockade.
Q: What kind of clue will I find on the planet?
A: DeepScan the planet, then transport the Survey Team. When they
come back, pay attention to what they are saying. and Use the
Comm Panel accordingly.
15.34 MASSACRE (MIRAK)
You are sent as the advance team of an invasion.
Q: How do I fight the base?
A: You don't. The defender ships will come out and engage you.
Destroy it (or at least wound it) but stay out of the way of the
base's phaser 4's.
Q: Where is the freighter going?
A: It's going toward the map border on the East (on the 2D
tactical map). Intercept and neutralize. If you wish you may
position you self on its path even before the ship is launched.
Q: still, what about the base?
A: Don't worry about it, your allies will take care of it.
15.35 BATTLE OF CLAW'S EDGE (MIRAK)
You are defending your planet.
Q: There are so many Lyran ships, what do I do?
A: Just Fight and enjoy the carnage.
15.36 IN SEARCH OF... (MIRAK)
Be sure to save the game before this mission.
Q: That is a big monster! I can't win?
A: In this mission you don't have to fire anything. Just use the
Comm panel and start talking. If you screw up badly, reload the
game from Saved Games. Eventually you will get the correct
responses.
Q: And which one is the Alien Homeworld?
A: Use DeepScan on each planet at close range.
15.37 WHITE WEDDING (MIRAK)
You are part of the final showdown against Lyrans.
Q: How do I find the admiral?
A: Read he objective carefully, the Admiral will be in the
Flagship. The flagship is easily recognizable in the game.
Q: How do I beam the admiral aboard?
A: Crack open a shield of the flagship, and beam Admiral through
Transporter Panel. (Infiltration Team Icon.)
Q: I have him, then what?
A: Do as the mission objective states. But DO NOT rejoin your
ranks yet. You may be in for a surprise if you do.
16 Dynaverse Online Play
A little history... Flipside.com was supposed to have hosted the
Dynaverse servers, but backed out just as the game went gold.
Interplay had to scramble to get servers online. Won.net was
enlisted as the substitute. Later, the registration changed yet
again to Gamespy.
Some information here have been summarized from the SFC Dynaverse
FAQ by K'tujHegh.
16.1 BEFORE YOU START
PLEASE patch your SFC2 to the latest version so you can get
online.
Register at the specified registration service if you haven't
done so.
Once you've done that, sign in and you'll see the Dynaverse
server list. You then choose a server to join. Different servers
may have slightly different rules and setup. Some servers permit
or prohibit certain races. Other servers can change ship
availability, supply costs, ship costs, mission chances, and
more. Read the description, and make your choice.
You can join multiple servers using the SAME username and
password. You can pick a difference race per server. You can play
on as many servers as you want. Each one is unique and the
progress is saved separately (until the admin decides to restart
the campaign).
16.2 INTRO TO DYNAVERSE
You start by logging in to a Dynaverse server. You begin with a
frigate in the race you've chosen. Each server can have different
rules and different prices. You also get 50 prestige pts to
start.
If a server you had been playing on is asking you for a login and
password again, the server admin had "reset" the campaign and
everyone had to start over.
You can only join "one" empire per server. To play more than one
side on a single server, you need to use multiple accounts.
Once you've logged into a Dynaverse server, you will see a map
just like a single player campaign map. Except this time, if you
right click on the map, you may notice other players in certain
hexes. If you right-click it, you will see the following
information:
{Rank} {Player Handle} {Glicko Rating}
Empire: {Empire Played}
Prestige: ####(available)/#### (Career total)
Ship #1
Ship #2 (if they have more then one)
Ship #3 (if they have more then two)
An example would be:
Commander Chang (355)
Empire: Federation
Prestige: 357 / 2355
(Destroyer) USS Tucson
The Glicko rating is basically a measure of how well you handle
battles and how are the odds in those battles. If you can beat
big ships with small ships, your Glicko rating would be quite
high. If you can only beat small ships, your Glicko rating would
be quite low.
When you first sign on, you are in the "General" channel and you
can chat with all other players. You can also join specific
channels. Some other commands are:
/list: Lists chat channels available. Those that you have
joined have an asterisk (*) in front.
/join [ channel ] : Joins a channel ( example: "/join
federation" )
/leave [ channel ] : Leaves a channel ( example: /leave
General" )
/w [name] : whisper to name
You can zoom the map in and out, move the map around, and choose
your movements, just like the single player campaign. Except this
time, there may be other REAL human players, who may be on your
side, or on the other side... And there will still be AI ships
around.
If you have friends online and on the same server at the same
time, use chat and invite them over. Tell them what hex you're in
(the hex number, in x,y format) and see if they will come over.
16.3 THE "DRAFT"
If you are in or near a sector where a battle just started, you
can be "drafted" into a mission. You can't "dodge" the draft
(legally, that is, there are way to "refuse" it, but it's
considered bad manners online). Basically, it's a mission you
need to play with others.
16.4 BUYING SHIPS
Dynaverse II has slightly different procedure for buying ships.
The ships are actually up for bid. You need to place a bid on the
ship you want. You may end up paying "above" market rates for a
specific ship if everybody wants it.
After you place the bid, you can move to a different hex. If you
win, the ship will join your fleet.
Older ships are cheaper. Newer ships, when first introduced, are
more expensive than normal.
16.5 SOME DO'S AND DON'TS
Do use the "chat" feature, it adds to the atmosphere.
Do help people on your side, it makes the game easier for
everyone.
Do ask for help if you need it
Do give rookies a break (i.e. those with low prestige totals).
You were once a rookie.
Do have fun out there.
----------
Do NOT refuse a draft, it's consider rude
Do NOT forfeit, as it both hurts your prestige pts and makes your
side lose
Do NOT insult anybody. Actions speak louder than words.
Do NOT try the dirty tractor tricks (push other ships into
asteroids or planets or out of the map)
Do NOT try to capture an enemy ship commanded by a human (you can
crash the game)
16.6 MODIFYING THE CAMPAIGN
NW has some tips if you want to edit the missions and the
campaigns a bit.
See http://www3.telus.net/NuclearWessels/sfc/mods.html
16.7 PARTING COMMENTS
The rest of online Dynaverse is just like the single player
campaigns.
Have fun out there. Perhaps you CAN make a difference!
17 SFC ships
Each empire has multiple classes of ships, from freighters to
frigates, from destroyers to dreadnoughts.
17.1 SHIP CLASSES OVERVIEW
The civilian / auxiliary ship classes are
* Small Freighters
* Large Freighters
The warship classes, from smallest to largest, are
* Fighters / Attack-Shuttles
* Interceptor (INT)
* Gunboat (a.k.a. Fast Patrol ship, pseudo-fighter) (PF)
* Police Corvette (POL)
* Frigates (FF)
* War Destroyer (DW)
* Destroyer (DD)
* Light Cruiser (CL)
* War Cruiser (CW)
* Heavy Cruiser (CA)
* Battlecruiser (BC/BCH)
* Dreadnought (DN)
* Battleship (BB)
In general, police corvette have 1 heavy weapon, frigates have 2,
destroyers have 3-4, cruisers have 4, dreadnoughts have 6, and
battleships have 10 (8 fore, 2 aft)
Note: Carriers (CV, which stands for "cruiser, aviation") can be
converted from all classes of ships. Most carriers are cruiser
sized (usually called "strike carrier") and converted from
cruisers. "Fleet Carriers" are converted from dreadnoughts.
"Battle carriers" are converted from battle cruisers. Light
carriers are converted from light cruisers. Small carriers
converted from frigates or destroyers are "Escort Carriers".
17.2 FREIGHTERS
That is discussed in the next section, in 18.
17.3 WARTIME CONSTRUCTION
In wartime, the smaller ships are easier to build as their
stardocks are easier to build. The larger ship hulls are needed
for certain specialized variants. When the losses start to mount,
shipyards must somehow increase production of larger ships. Thus,
the "war destroyers" and "war cruisers" are born.
A "war destroyer" is basically a frigate expanded to have the
power and weapons of a destroyer. It has less overall volume than
a destroyer, but can be built in a frigate shipyard.
A "war cruiser", similarly, is a destroyer or light cruiser built-
up to full cruiser, but can be built in destroyer/light-cruiser
shipyards.
Each race has its own solutions to the wartime construction
problem. For example, the Federation did not have a "war
cruiser". Its "new light cruiser" (NCL) design, using some of
destroyer's parts, essentially served as that design. The
Federation also had a competition between the FFB (battle
frigate) and the DW (war destroyer) and the DW was ultimately
chosen.
There are many other variants to each class. Some races chose to
build "leader" version of certain classes to act as 'squadron
leaders' when operating in a group. For example, a squadron of
Klingon F-5 frigates will be lead by a F-5L. For a list of
variants, see 17.5.
A battlecruiser is essentially a ship with the maximum amount of
firepower one can pack onto a cruiser hull. It can be built in a
regular cruiser shipyard. Eventually no more dreadnoughts were
made. They have been replaced by battlecruisers.
17.4 CARRIERS, FIGHTERS, INTERCEPTORS, AND GUNBOATS
Carriers are special ships designed to carry smaller vessels into
battle. Smaller vessels include fighters, interceptors (half-
sized gunboats), and gunboats (sometimes called Fast Patrol
ships, of PFs, and occasionally, Pseudo-Fighters).
Carriers were converted from regular dreadnoughts, cruisers,
destroyers, and so on. Some retained their regular armament.
Fighters are basically armed shuttles that carry drones and
perhaps some pre-charged heavy weapons. Each 'squadron' is
launched together and can be ordered to attack target or defend
you.
Interceptor and PF are individual entities and can be used to
attack many targets. They have shields and thus are harder to
kill, but one or two drone hits should kill one.
If the carrier is destroyed, so are all the units it carried into
battle. For example, if you destroy a carrier, all its fighters
(or PFs, if it's a PF tender) also blow up.
17.5 VARIANTS
All races operate multiple variants of ships. In general, the
most of a specific type that race builds, the more likely
different variants will be produced.
For example, a destroyer can be built as normal, drone, battle
(heavy), escort, and more.
In general, the cruiser has the most variants.
Here are some common suffixes used to denote the variants
A Aegis, a variant of Escort
B Battle (extra heavy), EX: FFB = battle frigate, almost a
destroyer
C Command, has flag bridge, slightly more weapons, EX: CC =
command cruiser
D Drone, lots of drone launchers, EX: NCD (new drone
cruiser, drone version of NCL)
E Escort, phaser heavy, few/no heavy weapons, EX: DDE =
destroyer escort
G Commando (except Federation), Guided/G-Rack refit
(Federation)
H Heavy, EX: DNH = heavy dreadnought
L Light or Leader
R Survey
T Transport
V Carrier, carries PFs, INTs, or fighter-shuttles
The Feds chose to use a C PREFIX for their commando ships.
17.6 POLICE CORVETTES (POL)
The police corvettes are the smallest standalone vessels operated
by a fleet. Sometimes, they are just called "police ships".
Klingons prefer the term "gunboats". They may lack heavy weapons
altogether, though some may have a single heavy weapon. They can
barely deter a pirate vessel. Don't expect one to survive in a
real battle.
Think of them as SMALL frigates, similar in size to PF's.
Some races built police flagships (leaders).
In general, the Feds build the best police corvette. Everybody
else has shields that are too thin.
17.7 FRIGATES (FF)
In general, frigates are very weak, and tend to blow up quickly
in presence of cruisers or larger ships. Cruisers with high
crunch power can blow up a frigate in a single alpha strike.
Frigates are in perpetual need of power because their available
power is quite small and any further use of power requires a
large decrease in speed. To get an extra point of power, a
cruiser slow by 1 (movement cost of 1), while a frigate need to
slow by 3 (movement cost of 0.33).
A frigate usually has only a single heavy weapon. If there are
several sizes of the weapon, a frigate would have the smallest
one (with lowest effective range).
With little power available, ECM, overload, and so on require
very careful consideration. EM is more efficient than ECM in most
cases.
Fighting with frigates requires a LOT of maneuvers, as neither
side can deal a "killing" blow.
When you fly frigates, you want the ones with the LEAST energy
usage. The drone frigates are probably the best. With a scatter-
pack you have the potential to kill larger ships.
For those frigates with low crunch power, use your maneuvers and
keep your range open. You need to play like a Klingon to survive.
17.8 WAR DESTROYER (DW)
A war destroyer is a frigate built-up to destroyer capability. It
is a destroyer missing a few parts. It has 2 heavy weapons and
movement cost of 0.5 like a destroyer.
17.9 DESTROYER (DD)
Destroyer, being the next size up, has slightly less of the power
problem. However, it can still be quite acute. It loses 2 in
speed for every point of power (movement cost of 0.5).
In general, destroyers have two heavy weapons. There are some
exceptions (the Fed DD had four photons, just like the Fed CA,
but no power to arm them, the DDG fixed that).
Destroyers have enough power to start using EW and shield
reinforcements sparingly.
A large or heavy destroyer is VERY close in size and capability
to a light cruiser. So much so, some navies chose not to build
light cruisers.
Destroyers still relies on maneuver, but a bit less than
frigates.
17.10 LIGHT CRUISER (CL)
In general, light cruisers have 3 or 4 heavy weapons like a CA,
but have less shields, phasers, and other equipment. Some CL's
have movement cost of 1 just like a CA.
Most CL's have only forward facing weapons. There are one or two
exceptions: the Fed Miranda-class cruiser has a rear-facing
photon torpedo. (This is to fit in with the USS Reliant in the
movie Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan)
Cruisers have power to spare for EW, but not that much in a CL.
17.11 WAR CRUISER (CW)
A war cruiser is a destroyer or light cruiser built-up to full
cruiser firepower. It would have 4 heavy weapons and movement
cost of 1, but slightly fewer weapons than a full cruiser. In
general it should "drive" just like a cruiser.
17.12 HEAVY CRUISER (CA)
A heavy cruiser usually has 4 heavy weapons, and movement cost of
1. There are some exceptions like the Klingon D-7T, which has 5
photon torpedoes (yes, photons).
A heavy cruiser is your average ship and can use all the tactics
discussed. Power can be a little tight in certain situations.
CA/CW should have some power left over to be able to move at
decent speed (24 or higher) and arm all weapons.
17.13 BATTLECRUISER (BCH)
A battlecruiser has 6 heavy weapons like the dreadnought, but
still has movement cost of 1. They eventually replaced the
dreadnought on the production line.
BCH is a bit tight on power as losing speed here doesn't yield as
much power as it would on a DN, while it has all those DN-class
weapons to charge. That's why the Feds build all the different
variations on the BCH trying to come up with a design that
doesn't suck up too much power.
Consider disabling one or two of the heavy weapons after the
initial pass so you get more power to maneuver. That way, the BCH
should fly just like a cruiser with a few extra weapons.
17.14 DREADNOUGHT (DN)
A dreadnought has 6 heavy weapons, and movement cost of 1.5.
A DN usually has globs of power to spare. By reducing speed by 1,
a DN can spare 1.5 pts of power. A DN should exploit this by
charging those energy-intensive systems like tractors, ECM, and
so on.
A DN's maneuverability is pretty bad, and it can't make an HET
safely, so you probably shouldn't. Instead, use your superior
firepower to pound smaller ships into scrap. You can probably
kill a frigate in a single pass. You have enough transporters to
capture small ships in one pass also.
17.15 BATTLESHIP (BB)
A battleship has 10 heavy weapons (8 fore, 2 aft) and movement
cost of 2. Some may carry PFs or fighters for additional
firepower.
Even bigger than the DN, a BB have a lot of power to spare, and
extremely heavy shields. Of course, it also turns like a pig.
Every point reduced in speed spares 2 pts of power, and that's a
lot. Requires a LOT of crunch power to get through one of those
shields. However, it CAN be killed given a bit of patience and
sufficient firepower.
Don't even THINK about using an HET in a BB. Instead, use your
superior firepower to kill ONE enemy ship at a time, esp. those
that can get past your shields (and frigates/destroyers probably
can't).
Battleships are vulnerable to seeking weapons such as scatter-
packs and plasma torpedoes due to their high crunch power. Be
ready with those defenses.
18 Freighters
Every race has freighters, and some has more models than others.
The freighters essentially fall into 3 sizes: small, medium, and
large. They also falls into several types: civilian, military, Q-
ships, and auxiliary naval.
The civilian freighters are very lightly armed. Most carry one Ph-
2, maybe some Ph-3's. Some may carry ADD for drone defense. The
refitted versions get an extra weapon or two, but are still very
lightly armed.
The military "armed" freighters have slightly heavier shielding
than the civilian versions, with a few more weapons, but are
still very weak.
Q-Ships are basically freighters converted to warships. They look
just like a freighter, until you get a closer scan. They also get
slightly heavier shielding. However, they are still quite weak
and have lousy acceleration just like a freighter.
Historical note: The idea originated in World War I, when the
German U-boats ruled the seas. At that time, it was customary for
a warship to demand the surrender of a merchant vessel. An U-Boat
must surface to demand the surrender of the merchant. The British
introduced the Q-ship, which is a normal merchant with hidden
guns on the deck. When the U-Boat surfaces and is in range, the Q-
ship will engage the submarine. Q-ship has only ONE chance... It
either sinks the sub right there, or it will die from torpedoes.
After multiple losses to Q-ships, Germans simply sank the ships
without warning. This is known as "unrestricted submarine
warfare".
The auxiliary naval freighters are freighters converted to other
uses, such as an auxiliary carrier (AuxCV). Those that use Fast
Patrol ships (PFs) use a similar ship called AuxPFT.
In a scenario, most freighters will not exceed speed 10 or 15,
except Q-ships. However, this is not always true.
18.1 FEDERATION
F-Lux Luxury Liner
F-Pres Presidental Liner
F-LMDr Large Merchant Ship (Drone
refit)
F-LMPh Large Merchant Ship (Phaser
refit)
F-LMQ Large Merchant Ship (Q-Ship)
F-MMDr Medium Merchant Ship (Drone
refit)
F-MMPh Medium Merchant Ship (Phaser
refit)
F-MMQ Medium Merchant Ship (Q-Ship)
F-SMDr Small Merchant Ship (Drone
refit)
F-SMPh Small Merchant Ship (Phaser
refit)
F-FSML Small Freighter
F-FLRG Large Freighter
F-FSPh Small Phaser-Armed Freighter
F-FLPh Large Phaser-Armed Freighter
F-FSDr Small Drone-Armed Freighter
F-FLDr Large Drone-Armed Freighter
F-FQS Small Q Ship
F-FQL Large Q Ship
F-AxCVL Auxiliary Small Carrier
F-AxCVA Auxiliary Large Carrier
The Feds have a full range of freighters. The "merchant" ships
are civilian-owned. Starfleet owns others.
Only the Q ships carry photon torpedoes. Others rely on phasers
and drones.
The two "Liners" are special ships that only appear on special
missions.
18.2 MIRAK
Z-FSML Small Freighter FREIGHTER
Z-FLRG Large Freighter FREIGHTER
Z-FSPh Small Phaser-Armed FREIGHTER
Freighter
Z-FSDs Small Disruptor-Armed FREIGHTER
Freighter
Z-FSDr Small Drone-Armed FREIGHTER
Freighter
Z-FLPh Large Phaser-Armed FREIGHTER
Freighter
Z-FLDs Large Disruptor-Armed FREIGHTER
Freighter
Z-FLDr Large Drone-Armed FREIGHTER
Freighter
Z-FQS Small Q Ship FREIGHTER
Z-FQL Large Q Ship FREIGHTER
Z-AxCVL Auxiliary Small Carrier CARRIER
Z-AxCVA Auxiliary Large Carrier CARRIER
Mirak are your typical freighter race. They don't have those
exotic types like the Feds. Only two sizes: large, or small. The
differences are regular, phaser, disruptor, drone, Q, aux. That's
it.
Most freighters are armed with only Ph-2s and Ph-3s. The Phaser-
armed, Q-ship, and Auxiliary may get Ph-1s. Most carry only 2
boarding parties.
18.3 OTHER FREIGHTERS
Everybody else operate freighters like the Mirak... They don't do
special variants like the Feds. The only difference would be in
armament. Hydrans would have Fusion- and phaser-armed freighters,
Klingons would have Drone-, disruptor, or phaser-armed
freighters, and so on.
19 Federation Overview
In general, Federation ships have good all-around shields, good
long-range firepower due to their photon torpedoes, and more
"hull" than other races so their ships can take a bit more damage
than other races and keep on running.
However, Federation ships are just average in most areas, like
maneuverability, firepower, available power, and so on. Many of
the ships also lack rear phaser coverage. There were a lot of
refits like the "plus" refit and the "R" refit to address some of
the shortcomings.
In general, the Feds have the most variants of ANY "empire".
19.1 GENERAL FED TACTICS
Federation ships generally have average to lousy heavy weapons
arcs. In general, the photons are FA arc only, so you have to
face the enemy to shoot.
Feds have relatively few weapons in the rear arc. The "R" refit
helped a little, but not enough, and not all ships have that
refit.
Protect your front and rear shields, as you really need them.
The photon torpedo is both a blessing and a curse. The long-
recharge time is a big problem. To do a lot of damage you have to
get in close, with overloaded photons. To do that, you're going
to need power, but your power is spent overloading photon.
Photons suck up a lot of power so don't expect to move very fast.
If you need to move faster, deactivate 1 or more photons.
On the other hand, photons are very flexible. You can stay at
long range and pound the enemy with proximity photons. You can
stay at medium range and engage with regular photons, or point-
blank with overloaded photons. The choice is yours.
Photons are susceptible to ECM. You need ECCM to counter any
enemy ECM. Charge at least 1 ECCM to make sure you counter any
enemy ECM.
Feds usually have a secondary weapon like drones to keep the
enemy busy while the photon reloads. Or you can combine the
weapons for a true alpha strike.
Feds have average number of transporters and boarding parties.
Against AI this is not a major problem, but against humans this
can be.
Your ship's maneuverability is average, so you won't be able to
outturn any one. Use HETs only for emergencies (such as enemy on
your tail).
In general, the Fed ship is designed to take the alpha strike of
enemy, and STILL reply with a devastating alpha strike.
As a Fed, you need to time the photons. Start slow and charge the
photons to regular or overload. When necessary, speed up to 24+,
get in close to shoot, then open the range again to recharge.
If the enemy won't let you get close, use prox photons to pound
them and wear them down.
19.2 COMMENTS BY CLASS
Freighters are discussed in their own section, as you'll never
"command" one.
You'll see me refer to "plus refit" or "R refit" a lot.
Basically, this is a wartime ship improvement program that added
some equipment on the ship, such as extra phasers that covers
rear-arc, extra drone launchers for missile defense, extra
shielding, etc.
19.2.1 Frigates and War Destroyers
F-POL Police Ship FRIGATE
F-POL+ Police Ship (plus FRIGATE
refit)
F-FF Frigate FRIGATE
F-FFG Improved Frigate FRIGATE
F-FFD Drone Frigate FRIGATE
F-FFD+ Drone Frigate (plus FRIGATE
refit)
F-FFE Frigate Escort FRIGATE
F-FFE+ Frigate Escort (plus FRIGATE
refit)
F-FFB Battle Frigate FRIGATE
F-DW War Destroyer WAR_DESTROYER
F-DWC Command War Destroyer WAR_DESTROYER
F-DWD War Drone Destroyer WAR_DESTROYER
F-CDW Commando War Destroyer SPECIAL
F-CFF Commando Frigate SPECIAL
F-CFF+ Commando Frigate (plus SPECIAL
refit)
F-PV+ Police Carrier CARRIER
NOTE -- the ships marked "SPECIAL" cannot be purchased for your
use.
There are three "types" of frigates in Federation service:
frigate, police corvettes, and war destroyer (basically a beefed-
up frigate to destroyer-level firepower). However, most of them
carry at least one photon torpedo launcher. The war destroyers
carry two.
Photons cause the same damage at any range if it hits, which is
good. This gives the Fed frigate a lot of crunch power, and
possibly one of the most balanced frigates. Can't really beat the
Mirak for crunch power (with scatter-pack) though.
The Feds are also the only ones to operate a police carrier. It's
not much of an improvement over the police ship. Two fighters
don't add much firepower to a tiny ship.
Fed frigates are actually pretty "standard". Try to get the drone
frigate, as that needs the least amount of power. Fed frigates
also have good shields, not just the front. This makes them more
survivable against larger ships in big battles.
Otherwise, just follow the standard frigate tactics (see 16.6).
19.2.2 Destroyers and Light Cruisers
F-DE Destroyer Escort DESTROYER
F-DER Destroyer Escort (R-refit) DESTROYER
F-SC Scout SPECIAL
F-SC+ Scout (plus refit) SPECIAL
F-DD Destroyer DESTROYER
F-DD+ Destroyer (plus refit) DESTROYER
F-DDG Guided Weapons Destroyer DESTROYER
F-DDG+ Guided Weapons Destroyer DESTROYER
(plus refit)
F-CL Light Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
F-CL+ Light Cruiser (plus refit) LIGHT_CRUISER
F-NCL New Light Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
F-NCL+ New Light Cruiser (plus LIGHT_CRUISER
refit)
F-NCD New Drone Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
F-NCD+ New Drone Cruiser (plus LIGHT_CRUISER
refit)
F-NEC New Escort Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
F-NAC New Aegis Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
F-NSC New Scout Cruiser SPECIAL
F-NSC+ New Scout Cruiser (plus SPECIAL
refit)
F-CLC Light Command Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
F-NCA New Heavy Cruiser NEW_HEAVY_CRUISER
F-NCM Miranda Class NEW_HEAVY_CRUISER
F-NCC New Heavy Command Cruiser NEW_HEAVY_CRUISER
F-NCT New Commando Transport SPECIAL
F-NCT+ New Commando Transport (plus SPECIAL
refit)
F-NVS New Strike Carrier CARRIER
F-NVL New Light Carrier CARRIER
F-NVL+ New Light Carrier (plus CARRIER
refit)
NOTE -- the ships marked "SPECIAL" cannot be purchased for your
use.
The Fed destroyers are a weird bunch. The original Fed DD is
basically a cruiser saucer with a warp nacelle instead of a
secondary hull. It actually had cruiser armament (4 photon
torpedoes) and not enough power to charge all of them. This was
quickly modified. Half of the photons are removed and replaced
with drone launchers, which don't use power, to create DDG.
Destroyer escorts are not regular fleet ships. Instead, they
designed to be a part of a carrier task force to protect the
carrier. They have most of their heavy weapons removed, replaced
with drone launchers, and their light Ph-3's replaced with
gatling Ph-G's. This allow them to move VERY fast and still fire
all weapons.
The Aegis ships are also escorts but not quite as specialized as
the true escorts. The Aegis ship carries the Aegis fire control
system that helps defend again drones, but still carry regular
weapons.
The Feds never really made a "war destroyer" class ship. Instead,
they created an excellent light cruiser platform called the NCL
(new light cruiser) from which a lot of the other variants are
based, including commando, command, even carrier.
The Fed Miranda-class cruiser has a rear-facing photon torpedo.
This is to fit in with the USS Reliant in the movie Star Trek II:
The Wrath of Khan.
The NCA is basically an NCL with a secondary hull and built-up to
CA standards.
If you got a regular DD, deactivate two of the photons as you go
into battle. If you got damaged, activate the undamaged ones and
use your repairs on something else.
If you got DDG or NCD, try to load a scatter-pack and do the
"anchor" on the opposing ship.
NCL/NCC/NCA are pretty balanced and can be flown as a regular Fed
ship. Start slow to overload the photons. Arm scatter-pack and
charge tractor beam if drone-equipped. Then increase speed to 20+
and chase the enemy down, any excess energy to front-shields. Get
into overload range and feed him the photon torpedoes and phasers
on an overrun or anchor. Repeat until dead.
19.2.3 Heavy Cruisers
F-CA Heavy Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
F-CA+ Heavy Cruiser (plus refit) HEAVY_CRUISER
F-CAR Heavy Cruiser (R refit) HEAVY_CRUISER
F-CAI Heavy Cruiser Improved HEAVY_CRUISER
F-CC Command Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
F-CC+ Command Cruiser (plus refit) HEAVY_CRUISER
F-GSC Galactic Survey Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
F-GSC+ Galactic Survey Cruiser (plus HEAVY_CRUISER
refit)
F-CAD Heavy Drone Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
F-CAD+ Heavy Drone Cruiser (plus refit) HEAVY_CRUISER
F-CADR Heavy Drone Cruiser (R refit) HEAVY_CRUISER
F-CB Heavy Command Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
F-BCG Battlecruiser (Kirov Class) HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
F-BCF Battlecruiser (Bismarck Class) HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
F-BCJ Battlecruiser (New Jersey Class) HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
F-BCE Battlecruiser Excelsior Class HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
F-CFS Fire Support Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
F-CFS+ Fire Support Cruiser (plus refit) HEAVY_CRUISER
F-CVS Strike Carrier CARRIER
F-CVS+ Strike Carrier (plus refit) CARRIER
F-CVL Light Carrier CARRIER
F-CVL+ Light Carrier (plus refit) CARRIER
F-BCV Battle Carrier CARRIER
The Fed cruisers are the benchmark all other cruisers are judged
by. Heavy shields, 4 photons, etc. etc. There are essentially 4
classes: regular (CA/CC), GSC, CB, and BCH.
The regular heavy cruiser (CA) is nearly the same as a command
cruiser (CC). The only differences are the addition of a "flag
bridge" and two more phasers on the secondary hull on the CC. Any
deficiencies are quickly rectified via the Plus and R refits.
The GSC is not really related to the regular "Constitution-class"
cruisers. Instead, GSC, as the name suggests, is a survey cruiser
to explore unknown sectors. It is basically half-scout, half-
cruiser. In wartime they sometimes operate as a light carrier
(CVL). Only Feds operate GSCs as a unique class. Other races
convert regular cruisers into survey cruisers.
The CB is basically the halfway point between the CA and the BCH.
The BCH, the ULTIMATE expression of the heavy-cruiser class, has
dreadnought armaments (or equivalent) on a cruiser hull. The Feds
are weird as they have FOUR separate variants of the BCH class.
Depending on the variant, they fly a bit differently. Some are
photon-heavy, while others have drones or even plasma torpedoes.
The different variations are needed to solve the power problems.
The drone version is probably the best.
The carriers have their secondary hulls converted to hangar bays
from the original variant. Most retained their original
armaments.
19.2.4 Dreadnoughts
F-DN Dreadnought
F-DN+ Dreadnought (plus refit)
F-SCS Space Control Ship
F-DNG Improved Dreadnought
F-DNH Heavy Dreadnought
F-DNF Plasma Dreadnought
F-CVA Heavy Carrier
F-CVA+ Heavy Carrier (plus refit)
F-BB Battleship
The first Federation dreadnought was a pretty abysmal failure, as
it only has 4 photons, same as the cruiser. The "Plus" refit
fixed that, but didn't quite add enough power to feed all six
tubes while maintain a decent speed, and lacks drone defense. The
DNG, which added some drone racks, fixed that.
DNF is a plasma-F-armed variant of the DNG.
The Fed CVA is basically a DN converted to a full carrier.
The SCS is basically a super CVA that carries an extra bomber
squadron externally. Federation does NOT operate PFs, so the Fed
SCS is a bit different from other SCS's.
DNH is half way between the DNG and the BB. Same number of
photons (6), but more drone launchers and phasers.
Fed BB basically is one huge photon shooter... 8 tubes forward, 2
rear, and a TON of phasers. It even carries a few fighters.
19.3 FIGHTING OTHER RACES
The Feds borders just about EVERYBODY, so they have to be
prepared to fight everybody. Feds are usually allied with Mirak,
Gorn, and Hydrans. They fight with everybody else.
19.3.1 Klingons
Klingons have ADDs, so drones and scatter packs don't work that
well unless you can make the Klingons use up their ADDs. If you
have drone-armed ships, don't fight on the Klingon border!
Klingons have low "peak output" and their ships aren't built
quite as strong as your ship. Your photons may take twice as long
to load, but does twice the damage as his disruptors, so if you
can blow down his shields, you'll cause more internal damage.
If Klingon launch a scatter-pack, consider using your photons in
proximity mode to kill it. If you get it, you would have taken
out most of his reloads. With the R-refit, you are less
vulnerable to scatter packs. Consider giving one back as your own
surprise.
If they choose to overrun, reinforce front-shields and BLAST them
point-blank, and thank them for their stupidity.
If they decide to do the "Klingon Saber Dance" (stay around range
15), arm regular torpedoes and see if he turns in or out. If he
turns out, shoot at his weaker rear shields. If he turns in,
overrun him with a sudden speed increase.
You can also try the "Starcastle" as a defensive maneuver.
Remember to counteract their ECM with your ECCM as your photons
are more affected by ECM.
Keep a few tractors to defend against their drones. Save the
phasers for the enemy SHIP.
19.3.2 Romulans
Hunting cloaked Romulans is difficult, as is dodging plasma
torpedoes.
Keep your speed up, 24 or higher, then load prox photons and
phasers and keep firing them 2 at a time to wear down his
shields, even when he's cloaked. Get closer when he's cloaked,
stay away when he's not. Reserve phasers for anti-torpedo
defense. Stay out of his torpedo firing arc so he can't shoot his
torpedo at you.
Scatter pack or drones can be useful if timed right, but wasted
otherwise.
Plasma torps don't do that much damage except the very large
ones. The danger is eating them on a downed shield.
19.3.3 Lyrans
The ESGs can be a problem as the ESG can be used for both ramming
(protect against overrun) and drone defense. Launch drones to
waste his ESG field so you can blast him with photons.
Otherwise, Lyrans are like Klingons without drones. They are
vulnerable to anchors as they don't carry ADDs. And your photons
have more crunch power than his disruptors. Just watch out for
those ESGs.
19.3.4 ISC
ISC ships are nicely equipped, as good as Feds, and armed with
PPDs and plasma torps. The smaller ships only have plasma, so if
you can eat the plasma on the side shields, your overrun will not
be affected. Keep the speed up to outrun the torpedoes.
PPD can be a problem as the "splash damage" can strip your facing
shields. Use reinforcements and left-right turns to spread the
damage.
Otherwise, ISC are like Romulans, except they don't cloak, and
thus vulnerable to seeking weapons. Anchors work great on ISC.
19.3.5 Other races
You should not be fighting Mirak, Hydrans, or Gorns as they are
usually your allies. However, here's are some quick tips.
Mirak is basically like Klingons, except Mirak use more missiles
than disruptors. Once you used up their missiles they are easily
defeated. Keep your tractors available for drone defense. Keep
your speed up and phasers in point-defense. Stay away from point-
blank to prevent him from doing an anchor on you.
Hydrans are like ISC but with heavier weapons closer-in.
Hellbores hit your downed shield no matter the facing. They also
like their fighters. Stay at range, kill the fighters, then
bombard the enemy ship with prox photons. With Ph-Gs Hydrans are
almost drone-proof.
Gorns are like Romulans that turn worse and don't cloak. Keep
your speed up and go for its rear shields. Stay away from those
plasmas and you should eat them for lunch. They don't fight
drones that well either.
19.3.6 Orions
Orions can be equipped with anything, but in general are smaller
and weaker than equivalent Starfleet ships. They can't take much
damage after their shields are penetrated. If they cloak, treat
them like Romulans.
Orions are vulnerable to anchors.
19.3.7 Monsters
There's nothing special about killing monsters with Feds. Just
use all the weapons, a scatter-pack if you can build one.
20 Klingons
In general, Klingon ships are faster, more manueverable, with
better weapon arcs, but less shielded (more shields up front than
rear), less hull (so can take less damage overall), and armed
with generally weapons with lower peak output.
The Klingons fight by maneuvers, exploit their superior weapon
arcs, and wear down the enemies. Klingons use their drones to tie
up enemy phasers rather than as a primary weapon. This is
opposite the Mirak.
Playing Klingons are generally quite difficult on the "timed"
missions, as you don't have time to wear down the enemy. You have
to exploit the scatter-pack to draw away enemy phasers and maybe
even get a few hits in.
Klingons needed a lot of refits as those disruptors don't quite
deliver the crunch power. In general, there are two, the B-refit
which added drone launchers, and K-refit, which improved phasers.
Klingon command ships (C variant) that received the K-refit are
re-designated as L variant. So a D-7C that received the K refit
is known as D-7L.
Klingons have a lot of transporters so capture and/or H&R are
good firepower supplements. Your marines CAN turn the tide of a
battle.
20.1 PRIMARY KLINGON TACTICS
Klingons invented the "saber dance" tactic. You need to maneuver
a bit and keep as far as possible.
You may be able to get some hits with a scatter-pack, but you
probably don't have enough launchers to provide a lot of reloads.
Most of your opponents have ADDs or phasers. Still, it may be
enough to surprise an opponent.
Klingons also like the oblique pass, as they have generally FA
(or even FH/FX) arcs.
20.2 COMMENTS BY CLASS
Freighters are discussed in their own section, as you'll never
"command" one.
Klingon ships have several refits. The B refit added B-class
drone launchers. The K-refit enhanced firepower, replacing Ph-2's
with Ph-1's.
The few Klingon ships with cloaking devices are designated Y
variants.
20.2.1 Frigates and Destroyers
The problem with Klingon frigates is they have PAPER-THIN rear
shields, except the F-5C/F-5L/F-6. Even the regular F-5 is too
vulnerable in the rear hemisphere to other frigates. Don't even
get me started about the E-3 and E-4... That's probably why
Klingons built so many different versions.
Survival in frigates is more about LUCK than anything else.
Upgrade to a bigger ship IMMEDIATELY. You may be able to win
against another frigate, but any one with a bit of crunch power
will break through your wimpy shields. Upgrade!
F-5 is sort of a destroyer...
F-6 is sometimes called a "frignought" as it has a lot more
weapon and power than a typical frigate, comparable to destroyers
or even light cruisers.
The G2 were not used in combat. They are police ships, pure and
simple.
K-G2 Police Gunboat FRIGATE
K-G2C Police Gunboat Leader FRIGATE
K-E3 Escort FRIGATE
K-E3E Carrier Escort FRIGATE
K-E3Y Bird of Prey FRIGATE
K-E4 Escort FRIGATE
K-E4B Escort (B-refit) FRIGATE
K-E4D Drone Escort FRIGATE
K-E4E Carrier Escort FRIGATE
K-E4EB Carrier Escort (B-refit) FRIGATE
K-E4G Commando Escort SPECIAL
K-E4GB Commando Escort (B-refit) SPECIAL
K-E4K Escort (K-refit) FRIGATE
K-E4Y Cloaking Escort FRIGATE
K-E6 Battle Escort FRIGATE
K-F5 Frigate FRIGATE
K-F5B Frigate (B-refit) DESTROYER
K-F5C Frigate Leader DESTROYER
K-F5G Commando Frigate SPECIAL
K-F5GB Commando Frigate (B- SPECIAL
refit)
K-F5S Scout SPECIAL
K-F5SB Scout (B-refit) SPECIAL
K-F5K Frigate (K-refit) DESTROYER
K-F5L Frigate Leader DESTROYER
K-F5V Light Carrier CARRIER
K-F5VK Light Carrier (K-refit) CARRIER
K-F5W War Destroyer DESTROYER
K-F5Y Cloaking Frigate DESTROYER
K-FWC War Destroyer Leader DESTROYER
K-FWK War Destroyer DESTROYER
K-FWL War Destroyer Leader DESTROYER
K-F6 Battle Frigate DESTROYER
NOTE -- the ships marked "SPECIAL" cannot be purchased for your
use.
20.2.2 Light Cruiser
Klingons don't believe in "light" cruisers until the war started.
Their "light" cruiser before the war was the D-6 series, the
predecessor of the D-7 series. The D-6 is short on weapons and
was mainly used to create "variant" ships and being exported to
the Romulans.
When the war came along, the Kozenko Design Bureau created the D-
5 "war cruiser" from scratch. It is basically a slightly shrunk D-
7, and quite a bit easier to build. The D-5 also has excellent
disruptor and phaser arcs to execute the saber dance.
Strangely, the D-5's are counted as "war destroyers", not war
cruisers, in SFC2. It is considered equivalent to a light
cruiser.
K-D5 War Cruiser WAR_DESTROYER
K-D5C War Command Cruiser WAR_DESTROYER
K-D5D War Drone Cruiser WAR_DESTROYER
K-D5E Escort Cruiser WAR_DESTROYER
K-D5G War Commando Cruiser SPECIAL
K-D5K War Cruiser (K-refit) WAR_DESTROYER
K-D5L War Command Cruiser WAR_DESTROYER
K-D5S Scout Cruiser SPECIAL
K-D5V Light Carrier CARRIER
K-D5W New Heavy Cruiser WAR_DESTROYER
K-D5Y War Cloaking Cruiser WAR_DESTROYER
K-AD5 Escort Cruiser WAR_DESTROYER
K-DWC New Command Cruiser WAR_DESTROYER
K-D6 Battlecruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
K-D6B Battlecruiser (B- LIGHT_CRUISER
refit)
K-D6D Drone Battlecruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
K-D6DB Drone Battlecruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
(B-refit)
K-D6G Commando Cruiser SPECIAL
K-D6GB Commando Cruiser (B- SPECIAL
refit)
K-D6K Battlecruiser (K- LIGHT_CRUISER
refit)
K-D6S Heavy Scout Cruiser SPECIAL
K-D6SB Heavy Scout Cruiser SPECIAL
(B-refit)
K-D6V Carrier CARRIER
K-D6VK Carrier (K-refit) CARRIER
NOTE -- the ships marked "SPECIAL" cannot be purchased for your
use.
20.2.3 Heavy Cruiser
Klingons love their D-7 so much, they have a lot of different
variants of it. Use the turn mode and firepower to wear the enemy
down.
The D-7C with the K refit is known as D-7L.
The D-7W is equivalent to the Fed CB.
The D-7T is a SFC2 only creation, in order to fit with the Star
Trek: The Motion Picture about Klingons firing photons and had a
rear launcher.
K-D7 Battlecruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
K-D7B Battlecruiser (B- HEAVY_CRUISER
refit)
K-D7C Command Battlecruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
K-D7D Drone Battlecruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
K-D7E Survey Cruiser SPECIAL
K-D7EB Survey Cruiser (B- SPECIAL
refit)
K-D7K Battlecruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
K-D7L Command Battlecruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
K-D7W Heavy Command Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
K-D7V Strike Carrier CARRIER
K-D7VK Strike Carrier (K- CARRIER
refit)
K-D7T Battlecruiser Ktinga HEAVY_CRUISER
Class
K-C7 Heavy Battlecruiser HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
K-C7V Battle Carrier CARRIER
NOTE -- the ships marked "SPECIAL" cannot be purchased for your
use.
The D-7D is a much superior ship to the D-6D. The D-7D retained
all of its disruptors, losing only some phasers in exchange for
the drone racks.
C-7 is excellent ship with a LOT of ADD/AMD and great disruptor
arcs. Also, check out its turn mode...
20.2.4 Dreadnoughts
Klingons are the most fanatical about their battleship, the B-10.
They manage to deploy the first battleship among all the galactic
powers. Even during the construction, design specs changed. The
second was redesigned as carrier (B-10V). The Klingons managed to
build THREE battleships during the General War, nearly
bankrupting the Klingon Empire. While contracts were drawn to
export one of these to the Romulans, and plans were drawn up for
an improved B-11, the total BB production run stopped at three.
The BB is basically a very large dreadnought, so behave that way.
Klingons are also unique to have built a "light" dreadnought
class, as well as having two variants of the main dreadnought
class.
The C8 and the C9 are designed for different borders. One is
designed for the Federation border while the other was designed
for the Hydran/Mirak border. Their armament differs slightly.
They are pretty good with power and weapons, but they have
relatively weak rear shields.
Some ships may have the K-designation, but they were BUILT that
way, so there was no "non-K" version of the ship. Examples
include the C-10K and the B-11K.
K-C5 Light Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
K-C5B Light Dreadnought (B- DREADNOUGHT
refit)
K-C5K Light Dreadnought (K- DREADNOUGHT
refit)
K-C8 Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
K-C8B Dreadnought (B-refit) DREADNOUGHT
K-C8K Dreadnought (K-refit) DREADNOUGHT
K-C8V Heavy Carrier CARRIER
K-C8VK Heavy Carrier (K-refit) CARRIER
K-C9 Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
K-C9B Dreadnought (B-refit) DREADNOUGHT
K-C9K Dreadnought (K-refit) DREADNOUGHT
K-C10K Heavy Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
K-B10 Battleship BATTLESHIP
K-B10K Battleship (K-refit) BATTLESHIP
K-B10V Superheavy Carrier CARRIER
K-B11K Super Battleship BATTLESHIP
20.3 FIGHTING OTHER RACES
Here's some discussion on fighting special enemies.
20.3.1 Federation
The "flatheads" build solid ships, and prefer overruns.
You can wear them down by saber-dancing. Use ECM to make their
photons miss, and stay out of overload range. Then hit them
during their reload cycle.
Use your drones to tie up their phasers. A scatter-pack may gain
you some hits as well. However, you may be a bit short on scatter-
packs.
Exploit their lousy firing arcs with oblique passes.
20.3.2 Mirak
The "furballs" have nicely powered ships, but not as solid as the
"flatheads".
The drones aren't THAT dangerous as most Klingon ships have ADDs.
Add the tractors and the side-phasers and your ship is pretty
well insulated from drones. You don't even need to worry about
anchors as you don't ever plan to use a weasel. Just stay out of
tractor range and wear them down.
Mirak generally has a lot of marines so this can be a problem
doing H&R or captures.
Mirak non-drone firepower tends to have pretty horrendous arcs,
like LS/RS. Exploit that.
20.3.3 Hydrans
The "snakes"... Can be a problem. Their ships are quite tough,
with a LOT of forward shielding. They also have fighters to
supplement their firepower.
Try to kill the fighters first. Their fighters can do you a lot
of harm by creating down-shields that the mothership can exploit
with hellbore. Their fighters should pull ahead of the ship. Save
your phasers and AMD/ADD for the fighters. Use drones on the
fighters too. Stay away from the ship and kill the fighters.
After the fighters on gone, do your normal saber-dance against
the Hydran ship. Stay out of fusion beam range. The snakes have
"two-turn" weapons. Charge in during his recharge cycle and use
H&R raids on his heavy weapons. His hellbore (if he has any)
don't do much damage at long range compared to your disruptors.
20.3.4 ISC
ISC ship is very good all around, esp. the heavier ships. Many
have rear I-torps that guard their rear arcs. The PPD can wipe
out your weapons if it finds your down shield. Those G- and S-
torps can really do you harm also.
Keep the speed high (24-26) and reserve phasers for point-
defense. Try to kill ONE ship at a time. You will have a very
hard time killing the heavy ships. Scatter-packs should be used
liberally. ISC is not that drone-proof. Saber-dancing CAN work
against the ISC but not that well as they can chase you all over
the map with plasma torps and PPDs.
20.3.5 Romulans and Lyrans
Romulans and Lyrans are traditionally friendlies (or "enemy of my
enemy") and thus you usually don't fight against them.
Romulans with cloak can be difficult to kill. Keep the speed
high. If the Romulan cloaks, move in to point-blank and do an
overrun from the side and exit to the rear. Have scatter-pack
ready to deploy the second he decloaks.
Lyrans need their ESG to do full damage. Thus saber-dancing can
wear them down.
20.3.6 Gorn
Usually a Klingon ship will never encounter a Gorn ship as the
Gorn is on the OTHER side of the Federation (on the Romulan
side).
Gorn ships are generally slow to turn but have good firing arcs
for their plasma torpedoes. Stay away, keep speed high, and wear
them down.
20.3.7 Orions
Orions can be armed with just about anything.
20.3.8 Monsters
Klingons have slightly harder time dealing with monsters, as
their drone launch rate is generally quite low (except for the
drone variants like D-6D or D-7D), but no harder than the Feds.
Most monsters do not have shields (except SGs) so the lower
"crunch power" of the Klingons does not matter that much.
21 Gorns
Gorns are intelligent saurians (dinosaurs) and are pretty slow
and clumsy, but very powerful. They design their ships the same
way... They don't turn well, but they have great torpedo coverage
arcs and those torpedoes will put a world of hurt on you. The
ships are also nicely shielded and can take a lot of damage.
They also have a lot of "marines" onboard (accounts for increased
combat prowess) and shuttles. However, they lack transporters
(too much bulk to beam?).
21.1 PRIMARY GORN TACTICS
Gorn invented the "anchor" tactic. They live and die by it.
The "split arc" of Gorn plasma launchers (half left and half
right) can also be used to do the "plasma string" and oblique
pass.
Gorns have a lot of shuttles, use them.
Consider conducting H&R raids on enemy tractors and phasers to
give yourself an advantage on phaser and torpedo exchange.
Charge suicide shuttles and drop them at overruns. You have
enough shuttles.
21.2 DISCUSSION BY CLASS
21.2.1 Frigates and Destroyers
Gorn frigates tend to be quite solidly built (similar to Fed
frigates), but lack weapons and shields. It only has 3 phasers
and 1 plas-F. The plas-F takes so long to charge, by the time it
does, the enemy would have already taken your plas-F offline.
Go minimum speed at beginning to gain time to arm, THEN keep
speed up to stay away from the enemy ship to recharge. Upgrade to
DD or BDD ASAP.
The destroyer is somewhat more interesting as it has better
torpedoes and better shields. To be honest, the DD is NOT really
heavy enough to be a DD. The BDD is more like it.
G-FF Police Frigate FRIGATE
G-FF+ Police Frigate (plus refit) FRIGATE
G-SC Scout SPECIAL
G-SCF Scout (improved) SPECIAL
G-PFT PF Tender (frigate) CARRIER
G-DD Destroyer DESTROYER
G-DD+ Destroyer (plus refit) DESTROYER
G-DDF Fleet Destroyer DESTROYER
G-DDL Destroyer Leader DESTROYER
G-DDL+ Destroyer Leader (plus refit) DESTROYER
G-DDG Commando Destroyer SPECIAL
G-DDG+ Commando Destroyer (plus SPECIAL
refit)
G-BDD Battle Destroyer WAR_DESTROYER
G-BDD+ Battle Destroyer (plus refit) WAR_DESTROYER
G-BDL Battle Destroyer Leader WAR_DESTROYER
G-BDL+ Battle Destroyer Leader (plus WAR_DESTROYER
refit)
G-BDG Battle Commando Destroyer WAR_DESTROYER
G-BDG+ Battle Commando Destroyer WAR_DESTROYER
(plus refit)
G-BDP Battle Destroyer PF Tender CARRIER
NOTE -- the ships marked "SPECIAL" cannot be purchased for your
use.
21.2.2 Heavy Destroyers and Light Cruisers
Gorn never did make light cruisers. Instead, they made "heavy
destroyer".
The CS and CM are heavier versions of the HDD. They have firing
arcs to use the oblique pass.
HDD has problem with rear arc coverage.
G-LSC Large Scout SPECIAL
G-HDS Heavy Destroyer Scout SPECIAL
G-HDS+ Heavy Destroyer Scout (plus SPECIAL
refit)
G-HDD Heavy Destroyer LIGHT_CRUISER
G-HDD+ Heavy Destroyer (plus refit) LIGHT_CRUISER
G-HDC Heavy Commando Destroyer SPECIAL
G-HDC+ Heavy Commando Destroyer (plus SPECIAL
refit)
G-CDD Heavy Command Destroyer LIGHT_CRUISER
G-HDP Heavy Destroyer PF Tender CARRIER
G-MCC Medium Command Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
G-CS Strike Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
G-CM Medium Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
NOTE -- the ships marked "SPECIAL" cannot be purchased for your
use.
21.2.3 Heavy Cruisers and Battlecruisers
Gorn cruisers were built from light, then heavy cruiser hulls.
The plus refit added some phasers, few more batteries for reserve
power, and improved shields. Later, many received F-refit which
increased the number of plas-F launchers to supplement their
close-in firepower against PFs.
CL is really a CA with slightly less equipment and hull... same
armaments. So watch out.
G-SR Survey Cruiser SPECIAL
G-SRF Survey Cruiser SPECIAL
G-CL Light Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
G-CL+ Light Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
G-CLF Light Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
G-COM Light Commando Cruiser SPECIAL
G-COM+ Light Commando Cruiser SPECIAL
G-COMF Light Commando Cruiser SPECIAL
G-CA Heavy Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
G-CA+ Heavy Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
G-CC Command Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
G-CC+ Command Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
G-CCF Command Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
G-BC Battlecruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
G-BF Fast Battlecruiser NEW_HEAVY_CRUISER
G-CCH Heavy Command Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
G-BCH Heavy Battlecruiser HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
NOTE -- the ships marked "SPECIAL" cannot be purchased for your
use.
21.2.4 Dreadnoughts
DNF is DN with extra F-torpedoes.
DNT is DN with extra G-torpedoes (need more firepower).
DNs have type-R torps, which is always fearsome.
G-DNE Early Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
G-DNL Light Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
G-DN Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
G-DNF Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
G-DNT Plasma Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
G-DNP PF Dreadnought CARRIER
G-DNH Heavy Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
G-BB Battleship BATTLESHIP
21.3 FIGHTING YOUR ENEMIES
Here's some discussion on fighting special enemies.
21.3.1 Romulans
The traditional enemy, you want to force the Rommie to give up
the initiative by cloaking, then you can do what you want with
him.
21.3.2 ISC
ISC ship is very good all around, esp. the heavier ships. Many
have rear I-torps that guard their rear arcs. The PPD can wipe
out your weapons and engines if it finds your down shield. Those
G- and S-torps can really do you harm also.
Keep the speed high (24-26) and reserve phasers for point-
defense. Try to kill ONE ship at a time. You will have a very
hard time killing the heavy ships.
21.3.3 Lyrans
To be completed, wrong side of galaxy.
21.3.4 Federation, Mirak, Hydrans
Gorns usually don't fight the Feds as they're allies (after that
little initial misunderstanding). Still, if you must fight one,
draw out his photons, then see if you can get him to give up the
initiative by using his wild weasels, THEN take him with
torpedoes.
Mirak and Hydrans are on the wrong front, and are nominal allies.
To kill Mirak, you need to slow him down and the best way is to
force him to weasel, or anchor. Your phaser arcs should be
sufficient for drone defense. Hydrans would want to get close to
you, so underload your torpedoes and fly all around him, killing
his fighters, then himself.
21.3.5 Orions
Orions can be armed with just about anything.
21.3.6 Monsters
Gorn don't have particular difficulties against monsters. Use
enveloping torpedoes except against astro-miners and sungliders.
22 Hydrans
Hydrans have several specialties... They love fighters (a lot of
their ships carry small squadrons). They have fusion beams (close-
range heavy weapon). They have hellbores (which damages your
weakest shield, even if non-facing). Hydrans also use gatling
phasers for point-defense. If you get close to them, they will
destroy you.
Hydran ships often carry a couple fighters as fire support. As
Hydrans don't use drones, their fighters rely on mini-Hellbore,
mini-Fusion, and phasers to do damage. As a result, Hydrans tend
to lose ALL fighters during a fight, and that can be a
significant drain on your prestige pts. Try to find the variants
that have little or NO fighters onboard, or try NOT to launch
them unless you really need them. Replacing 100-200 pts of
fighters per battle is NOT fun. This is even worse under AI
control.
In SFB history, the Klingons and the Lyrans once conquered the
Hydran Kingdom. However, the invaders managed to miss a few
colonies, and it was from these few colonies, and through some
outside help (from the Feds and Mirak) did the Hydrans regained
their territory. They are mortal enemies with the Klingons and
Lyrans, and by extension, are friendly to the Feds and Mirak (and
Gorn).
The Hydrans only have a "plus refit", which improved shields and
added one or two more phasers. Hydran ships, however, tend to
have a LOT of ph-2's. Only later ships and heavier ships get ph-
1's. Some of that was addressed by the refit.
Hydrans are in general very short on transporters. Even their
heavy cruisers only have like 2 or 3 transporters, compare to 4
or more of other races. Capturing other ships can be difficult.
Also, the fighters can blow up the ships you intend to capture.
22.1 PRIMARY HYDRAN TACTICS
Hydran ships fall into two distinct camps: the "chargers" armed
with Fusion Beams, and the "shooters" armed with Hellbores. As a
result, they have very different tactics. Eventually Hydrans made
the "hybrid" ships that carries both, but that's another story.
The "chargers" basically use the overrun by charging in with
fusion beams on overload, and fire all weapons at point-blank. It
is not subtle, and it works. At the minimum, it creates a down-
shield, which can be exploited by the Hellbore-armed ships and
perhaps fighters.
The Hellbore-armed "shooter" ships exploit the down-shields or
the lowest shields from a distance. Hellbore as a heavy weapon is
relatively weak, so you need something else to weaken or down a
shield so you can use Hellbore to do internals. The Hellbore
versions also have slightly more power.
Hellbore is great to exploit the Mizia concept. [See 6.10]
The hybrid ships can do both. Indeed, the "hybrid" ships should
use the charge tactic to beat down an enemy shield with fusion
beams and such, then use the hellbore to exploit the down shield.
If you got a "specialized" ship (i.e. all hellbore or all fusion
beam), pick fighters that will complement your weapons. If you
get a "hybrid" ship, get hellbore fighters.
An overloaded Hellbore is also a very strong overrun weapon. At
point-blank range a salvo of 4 hellbore (can't miss) do
significant amount of damage, esp. with a down shield. If you
only have one or two, don't bother with Hellbore overrun.
In a fleet battle, fusion-armed ships should collaborate with
hellbore-armed ships.
The AI ships tend to send their fighters to "charge", thus losing
them. Give AI control of the fighter-less ships (or at least the
one with the least fighters) to lessen the "drain" of prestige.
One special maneuver is the "Hydran Anchor" performed with fusion
ships. Allocate full power to tractors, speed, and
reinforcements, none to weapons. Anchor the other guy, and
EmerDecel. Take his alpha strike on the reinforced shields. Set
speed zero, charge suicide overload. By the time the enemy
charges enough to break your tractor, your suicide overload
should be ready. Pound enemy ship into scrap.
22.2 COMMENTS BY CLASS
Hydran ships are ALL short on transporter. Use assault shuttles
when you need to capture targets, and recall the fighters so you
don't blow up the target first.
Hydran ships tend to have Ph-2's instead of the more powerful ph-
1's. Some of the shortcomings were addressed by the refit.
22.2.1 Frigates
Hydran frigates are very fragile, and REALLY needs power.
The Hellbore-version have so little crunch-power, you need
phasers just to make a dent in the enemy's shields. And with only
ph-2's, you need to be very close.
The fusion-armed version is a bit better, but still not enough
power to overload AND fly at good speed. You CAN fire fusion
beams at range 8, but it doesn't do that much damage.
It has gotten so divisive that Hydrans have to produce "combo"
class that has both fusion beam and hellbore as "leaders". Then
they tend to make 3 versions of that... equal, more Hellbore,
more Fusion.
The Gendarme has 2 fighters as firepower supplements. Don't
expect them to kill the enemy for you. Perhaps this is where the
Feds get the idea for the "police carrier"?
Upgrade, upgrade, upgrade. You can't survive for long in a
frigate.
The DWF/DWH/DWL triumvirate is basically built up versions of
Hunter, Cuirassier, and Crusader, respectively, to a war
destroyer.
The EH (all phasers) has less power problems, but less crunch
power.
The CVE only carries 4 fighters, and thus are not that
interesting.
H-GEN Gendarme Police Ship FRIGATE (Fu)
H-GEN+ Gendarme Police Ship (plus FRIGATE (Fu)
refit)
H-SC Scout SPECIAL
H-HN Hunter Frigate FRIGATE (Fu)
H-HNG Commando Hunter Frigate SPECIAL
H-CU Cuirassier Frigate FRIGATE (He)
H-CRU Crusader Frigate Leader FRIGATE (both)
H-EH Escort Hunter Frigate FRIGATE (phaser)
H-DWF War Destroyer WAR_DESTROYER (Fu)
H-DWH Rhino Hunter War Destroyer WAR_DESTROYER (He)
H-DWL Lion Hunter Destroyer Leader WAR_DESTROYER (Both)
H-CVE Scythian Escort Carrier CARRIER
NOTE -- the ships marked "SPECIAL" cannot be purchased for your
use.
22.2.2 Destroyers and light cruisers
Again, the Hydrans divide the ships to 3 classes... fusion,
hellbore, leader (both). There are a few "escort" versions, but
those are pretty rare, as most Hydran ships are "casual" carriers
that carries a few fighters.
The three destroyer leaders carry both Hellbores and Fusion
Beams. The three variants started from slightly different
starting points. Warrior is the best of the 3, as it carries 2
Fu, 2 Hb, 1 more phaser, and 2 fighters.
Hydrans quickly realized that their destroyers were too small to
survive in heavier engagements. So they quickly moved to "light
cruiser" and later expanded them into "medium cruisers".
The medium cruisers all mount mixed weaponry, but usually they
are still "leaning" toward one side. Some have more Hellbores,
others have more Fusion Beams. Tartar and Apache do not carry
fighters, thus loses a bit of the punch.
The fusion-armed cruisers are more powerful up close, but you
really want a "mixed" ship. In general, you beat down a shield
with the fusion beams and/or phasers, then use hellbore to strip
the other ship by exploiting "hit any down shield" feature. When
the enemy is severely damaged, you start closing in and kill it
with overloaded hellbores and fusion beams.
The escort variants can carry up to 4 fighters. They are meant to
protect the carrier(s).
H-LN Lancer Destroyer DESTROYER (Fu)
H-LN+ Lancer Destroyer (plus-refit) DESTROYER (Fu)
H-LNG Commando Lancer SPECIAL
H-LNG+ Commando Lancer (plus-refit) SPECIAL
H-KN Knight Destroyer DESTROYER (He)
H-KN+ Knight Destroyer (plus-refit) DESTROYER (He)
H-DE Destroyer Escort DESTROYER (Ph)
H-DE+ Destroyer Escort (plus-refit) DESTROYER (Ph)
H-CNT Count Destroyer Leader DESTROYER (Both)
H-ERL Earl Destroyer Leader DESTROYER (Both)
H-WAR Warrior Destroyer Leader DESTROYER (Both)
H-SR Outrider Survey Ship DESTROYER
H-SR+ Outrider Survey Ship (plus-refit) DESTROYER
H-HR Horseman War Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER (Fu)
H-HR+ Horseman War Cruiser (plus-refit) LIGHT_CRUISER (Fu)
H-TR Traveler Light Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER (He)
H-TR+ Traveler Light Cruiser (plus- LIGHT_CRUISER (He)
refit)
H-NSC Chasseur New Scout Cruiser SPECIAL
H-NSC+ Chasseur New Scout Cruiser (plus- SPECIAL
refit)
H-CAT Cataphract Commando Cruiser SPECIAL
H-NEC New Escort Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER (Ph)
H-NEC+ New Escort Cruiser (plus-refit) LIGHT_CRUISER (Ph)
H-BAR Baron Light Command Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
(Both)
H-MNG Mongol Medium Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
(Both)
H-COM Comanche Medium Command Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
(Both)
H-TAR Tartar Medium Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
(Both)
H-APA Apache Medium Command Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
(Both)
NOTE -- the ships marked "SPECIAL" cannot be purchased for your
use.
22.2.3 Heavy Cruisers
There are basically three classes of heavy cruisers: new heavy
(built up from the medium cruisers), the regular heavy cruisers,
and the heavy battlecruisers.
Even in these large ships, the division between fusion and
hellbore continues. All these ships mount a mix of them, most
classes lean to one side or the other.
Hydran cruisers are quite solidly built and have the power to
move and fight properly. Almost all of them carry some fighters
(the carriers obviously carry more).
H-MHK Mohawk New Heavy Cruiser (Fu) NEW_HEAVY_CRUISER
H-CHY Cheyenne New Heavy Cruiser NEW_HEAVY_CRUISER
H-IRQ Iroquois New Heavy Cruiser (He) NEW_HEAVY_CRUISER
H-SUI Sioux New Command Cruiser NEW_HEAVY_CRUISER
H-UH Uhlan Carrier CARRIER
H-UH+ Uhlan Carrier (plus refit) CARRIER
H-NVL Trooper New Light Carrier CARRIER
H-NVL+ Trooper New Light Carrier (plus CARRIER
refit)
H-COS Cossack Medium Carrier CARRIER
H-RN Ranger Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
H-RN+ Ranger Cruiser (plus refit) HEAVY_CRUISER
H-LC Lord Commander Command Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
H-DG Dragoon Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
H-DG+ Dragoon Cruiser (plus refit) HEAVY_CRUISER
H-LM Lord Marshal Command Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
H-LB Lord Bishop Command Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
H-D7H Modified Klingon Battlecruiser SPECIAL
H-CHA Lord Admiral Command Cruiser HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
H-CHC Lord Cardinal Heavy Command HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
Cruiser
H-OV Overlord Battlecruiser HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
H-OS Overseer Battle Carrier CARRIER
H-CAV Cavalier Heavy Carrier CARRIER
H-CAV+ Cavalier Heavy Carrier (plus CARRIER
refit)
NOTE -- the ships marked "SPECIAL" cannot be purchased for your
use.
A footnote... The D7H is a captured Klingon D-7 converted to
Hydran technology. It doesn't fly that well, and is mainly to
make Klingons look bad.
Overseer is the 'carrier' conversion of Overlord.
22.2.4 Dreadnoughts and Battleships
H-PAL Paladin Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
H-PAL+ Paladin Dreadnought (plus DREADNOUGHT
refit)
H-PAH Paladin Heavy Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
H-IC Iron Chancellor CVA CARRIER
H-IC+ Iron Chancellor CVA (plus CARRIER
refit)
H-ID Iron Duke Fleet Carrier CARRIER
H-MNR Monarch Battleship BATTLESHIP
H-MNV Monarch-V Heavy Carrier BATTLESHIP / CARRIER
The Paladin DN is a very decent ship if a bit weak in crunch
power, but up close you can always use the fusion beams. The
"heavy" version added more phasers.
The "Iron Duke" is basically an expanded "Iron Chancellor" with a
few more power, and retained some heavy weapons (4 Hellbores).
They can't call it a battle carrier (that's for a battlecruiser
converted to carrier), so it's called a "fleet carrier".
These big ships can carry up to 4 groups of 4 fighters each, for
total of 16 fighters. Each fighter is equipped with ph-G's and
perhaps Hellbores. As a group, they can be quite dangerous.
22.3 FIGHTING OTHER RACES
Here's some discussion on fighting special enemies.
22.3.1 Federation / Mirak / Gorn
These are normally your allies, so you wouldn't be fighting them.
However, it's nice to know your enemy's weaknesses.
The Feds usually have lousy maneuverability and their crunch
power doesn't QUITE measure up to your fusion beams. After you
give him a good alpha strike pull back and use hellbore to
exploit the down shield, while stay away from his prox photons.
Mirak has a LOT of drones, but you should have ph-G for defense.
Reserve them and the tractors and you should be drone-proof. Then
it's just a matter of killing a drone-less Mirak. Keep your speed
at the same speed as the drones. The fighters defend themselves
quite well against drone swarms and will defend you also.
Gorn has lousy maneuverability and your phasers can make a dent
in those plasmas. Keep your speed up and reserve those ph-Gs for
point-defense. Fly like a Klingon, dance at long-range and
"plink" them to death. Think of them as clumsier Romulans.
22.3.2 ISC
You should fight ISC like Romulans.
To be completed.
22.3.3 Romulans
Hydrans against Romulans can be a tough fight, as Hydrans usually
don't fight Rommies. (Wrong front.)
The fighters can be quite useful to surround cloaked ships so
they get a beating while trying to decloak. Then the Rommie gets
a rude choice... Shoot the torpedo at the fighters while you
swoop in, or shoot the torpedo at you and get plinked by the
fighters.
Keep your speed up and watch for those torpedoes. You have enough
phaser power to reduce the impact, but you will take damage. When
the enemy is recharging, get in there and give them a licking at
point-blank range. Use your fighters to keep them busy while you
recharge.
22.3.4 Lyrans
Lyrans with their ESG can be bad for the fighters. Set fighters
to harass and use Hellbores to bring down the ESG. Then close in
for the point-blank fusion beam fusillade. At close range your
fusion beams beat his disruptors. Consider launching the fighters
AFTER you made your first pass.
22.3.5 Orions
Orions can be armed with just about anything.
22.3.6 Monsters
Hydrans typically have problem with the plasma-armed monsters
(who doesn't?). Other monsters are pretty easy to kill with
fighters' help.
23 ISC
ISC is a lot like the Federation, even MORE idealistic. They
honestly believe they can conquer the galaxy and enforce peace on
everyone. Their ambition however, is further than their fleet can
reach.
ISC ships are pretty decent. Their PPD is an interesting weapon
that is sort of like direct-fire plasma torpedo yet it spreads
among multiple shields. The main problem with the PPD is its
limited engagement range, with both a max range and a min range.
Smaller ISC ships gets plasma torpedoes instead, and usually in
smaller calibers than other plasma powers.
ISC ships tend to be the most expensive of all, even MORE
expensive than the Feds, mainly due to those rear plas-I
launchers of the Z variants.
ISC is vulnerable to drone swarms. Reserve phasers and tractors
for drone defense.
ISC is vulnerable to the rear, esp. against attrition units like
fighters and PFs. They then embarked on a massive refit program
that added plas-I launchers to many of their larger ships as Z-
refit. The smaller ships get the W-refit which added rear-arc
phasers.
ISC does not operate plas-R. Only the Gorn and the Romulans
operate plas-R launchers.
23.1 PRIMARY TACTIC
Your tactics depend on which ship you got.
If you got an all-plasma ship, you can fly like a Romulan or a
Gorn, but with better rear-arc firepower (if you got one of those
Z-variant ships).
If you got a PPD ship, go passive and strip the front shields
from the approaching enemy ships, then feed them the torpedoes.
23.2 COMMENTS BY CLASS
When ISC started their War of Pacification, they quickly
discovered that their ships aren't really THAT superior to the
other ships once the "surprise" wore off. They then went on a
hurried ship improvement program, and ended up with FOUR of them:
the P refit, the W refit, Y refit, and the Z refit.
The P-refit replaced half of the heavy plasma launchers with
PPDs. The plasma long-range firepower really isn't that good, so
some were converted to the P variant to improve long-range
firepower.
The W-refit added some phasers for rear-arc coverage. This is
mainly for the smaller ships who need to tackle rear-arc threats
and can't receive the Z refit.
The Y-refit updated plas-G launchers to plas-S. This improved
firepower quite a bit.
The Z refit, only for larger ships, added the rear plas-I
launchers. This significantly increased the BPV of the ships, at
least on paper. In reality, the plas-I launchers have severe
tactical limitations against ship-sized targets.
ISC ships, in general, are EXPENSIVE. A light cruiser is 1000,
and a full-fledged cruiser is 1700-2000.
23.2.1 Frigates and Destroyers
ISC frigates are about your "average" frigate, but seem to have
VERY little crew. It is EASY to capture one if you have 3 or more
transporters.
The FFE isn't that bad as it's an extremely fast "phaser boat".
The pl-D isn't that useful against non-drone races, but the
phasers cycle fast and do lots of damage.
You should consider upgrade to CL quickly.
The DDG has more "crunch power" and thus is the most desirable
one here.
I-POL Police Corvette FRIGATE
I-POLW Police Corvette (war refit) FRIGATE
I-EFF Early Frigate FRIGATE
I-FF Frigate FRIGATE
I-FFW Frigate (war refit) FRIGATE
I-FLG Police Flagship FRIGATE
I-FLGW Police Flagship (war refit) FRIGATE
I-FFE Escort Frigate FRIGATE
I-FFL Frigate Leader FRIGATE
I-CDD Commando Destroyer SPECIAL
I-CDDW Commando Destroyer (war refit) SPECIAL
I-EDD Early Destroyer DESTROYER
I-DE Destroyer Escort DESTROYER
I-SC Scout SPECIAL
I-SCW Scout (war refit) SPECIAL
I-DD Destroyer DESTROYER
I-DDW Destroyer (war refit) DESTROYER
I-DDZ Destroyer (Z refit) DESTROYER
I-DDL Destroyer Leader DESTROYER
I-DDLZ Destroyer Leader (Z refit) DESTROYER
I-DDG Plasma G Destroyer DESTROYER
I-DDGZ Plasma G Destroyer (Z refit) DESTROYER
I-CVE Escort Carrier CARRIER
I-CVEZ Escort Carrier (Z refit) CARRIER
NOTE -- the ships marked "SPECIAL" cannot be purchased for your
use.
23.2.2 Light Cruisers
ISC light cruisers are pretty decent ships, if not too
spectacular. They are comparable to Gorn and Romulan ships in
terms of plasma power. They also have excellent shields.
I think the Light cruiser, CL, is quite well built, and it has 2
S-torps making it quite flexible. The CLZ has the rear I-torps
which are even more useful. If you want faster firepower, try
underloading to plas-G or even plas-F. Those phasers can pretty
hard-hitting. The CM has PPD and 2 G-torps, a good combination.
CS only had PPD, not a good combination IMHO.
The CPF and CPFW are the ISC "war cruisers" that were built up to
heavy cruiser specs. However, they appear to be over-rated, as
they don't seem to have that much firepower.
I-ECL Early Light Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
I-CL Light Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
I-CLW Light Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
I-CLY Light Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
I-CLZ Light Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
I-CM Medium Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
I-CMP Medium Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
I-CMZ Medium Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
I-CSP Strike Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
I-CSZ Strike Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
I-CLG Commando Cruiser SPECIAL
I-CLGZ Commando Cruiser SPECIAL
I-CE Escort Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
I-HSC Heavy Scout SPECIAL
I-HSCZ Heavy Scout SPECIAL
I-ESR Early Survey Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
I-SR Survey Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
I-SRW Survey Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
I-SRZ Survey Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
I-CPF Constabulary Flagship NEW_HEAVY_CRUISER
I-CPFW Constabulary Flagship NEW_HEAVY_CRUISER
I-CVL Light Carrier CARRIER
I-CVLZ Light Carrier CARRIER
I-CVLP Light Strike Carrier CARRIER
I-CVLS Light Strike Carrier CARRIER
NOTE -- the ships marked "SPECIAL" cannot be purchased for your
use.
23.2.3 Heavy Cruisers and Battlecruisers
ISC went through several iterations trying to find the right
balance of firepower to combat the other galactic powers on the
War of Pacification. Their Starcruiser class has no less than 7
variations (not variants, but improved models). And these ships
are EXPENSIVE... In the 2000 or more range, which are as
expensive as some BCH's.
The armored cruiser is an odd duck as it actually carries hull
armor in addition to shields, making it the only ship to carry
internal armor besides older Romulan ships.
I-ECA Early Star Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
I-CA Star Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
I-CAW Star Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
I-CAP Star Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
I-CAY Star Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
I-CAZ Star Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
I-CAA Armored Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
I-CAAZ Armored Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
I-ECC Early Flagship Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
I-CC Flagship Cruiser HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
I-CCY Flagship Cruiser HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
I-CCZ Flagship Cruiser HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
I-CV Fleet Carrier CARRIER
I-CVZ Fleet Carrier CARRIER
I-CVS Strike Carrier CARRIER
I-CVSZ Strike Carrier CARRIER
23.2.4 Dreadnoughts
The DN/DNZ has only PPDs, so the DNT replaced half of the PPDs
with plas-S launchers for more tactical flexibility.
I-EDN Early Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
I-DN Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
I-DNZ Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
I-DNT Torpedo Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
I-CVA Heavy Carrier CARRIER
I-CVAZ Heavy Carrier CARRIER
I-BB Battleship BATTLESHIP
I-BBZ Battleship BATTLESHIP
23.3 FIGHTING SPECIFIC RACES
23.3.1 Klingon
Get close to Klingon and unload the plasma torpedoes. Use PPD to
strip his shields so the plasma can punch through. Let him come
to you. He can eat the rear I-torps if he want to come behind
you.
23.3.2 Romulan
Romulans will fire a few shots, then hide under cloak. You have
to rely on phasers... Overrun them while they're cloaked, and
POUND them at point-blank with phasers. While damage is reduced,
you CAN still take down a shield and do some internals. Repeat.
Have weasel ready in case they catch you reloading. Use pseudos
to encourage the Romulans to stay cloaked.
23.3.3 Mirak
With plenty of ph-3s and tractors, you should be drone-proof.
Just feed the Mirak as much plasma as it takes. Don't get caught
by a Mirak anchor.
23.3.4 Hydrans
For the fusion beam ships, stay away. Take out the fighters with
phasers and rear-I-torps. Then shoot the ships from a distance of
about 10, "cross the T" so you can shoot both front and rear
torps. Rotate 180 and shoot the other side also.
23.3.5 Federation
Add power to ECM to make his photons miss. Then pound them with
your higher-shock value plasmas. If he want to overrun, stay out
of overload range and feed him front/rear torpedoes. If he wants
to use proximity photons, your PPDs will fry him.
23.3.6 Gorn
Plasma vs. plasma can be ugly. Use Gorn's lack of maneuverability
against them. Use high speed and both front-rear torpedoes to
your best effect. Try to get behind one and STAY there. H&R /the
heavy torpedoes.
23.3.7 Lyrans
Stay out of ESG range. Consider turning off the PPD as you need
to maneuver and PPD shots aren't that easy to make. Use plasma
(both front and back). Keep the speed up.
23.3.8 Orions
Orions can be armed with just about anything.
23.3.9 Monsters
Normal ISC tactics works against monsters. Shielded ones eats
normal torpedoes, while unshielded ones eat enveloping torpedoes.
24 Lyrans
Lyrans are like Klingons, except they use ESGs (expanding sphere
generators), which basically puts out a forcefield that can be
used for drone defense, shuttle defense, and ramming. They use
disruptors as secondary weapons.
Lyrans are mortal enemies of the Mirak. Their ESG was designed to
counter the Mirak drones.
Lyran ships were notoriously short on power. Several of the
refits added power, then more power.
Some Lyran ships carry 2 or more INTs as firepower supplements,
without being designated a "carrier". Beware of these "casual PF
tenders".
The ESG is a difficult weapon to use well. They are great in
overruns but they don't do damage until extremely close range,
and they have limited duration. If you dance at extended range
they are useless.
The Lyran AI seems to be vulnerable to long-range drone
bombardments. It doesn't seem to power up the ESG except when you
are nearby. So if you can launch a swarm at it from beyond range
15 often it will not power up the ESG and many drones will get
through.
24.1 GENERAL LYRAN TACTICS
Lyrans love the overrun so they can put their ESG to work.
Lyran ships tend to have FA arc firepower so they can do the
oblique pass, but their ESG needs overrun.
Consider leaving the ESG off and do multiple oblique battle
passes (like the Klingons), then suddenly reverse course with HET
and overrun the enemy with ESG popped.
24.2 COMMENTS BY CLASS
Lyran ships have two refits, the plus refit, which improved
shields, and P refit, which improved phasers.
There's occasionally the F variant, which is the P variant
carrying 2 INTs.
24.2.1 Frigates and War Destroyers
L-MP Military Police Ship FRIGATE
L-MP+ Military Police Ship FRIGATE
L-FF Cheetah Frigate FRIGATE
L-FF+ Cheetah Frigate FRIGATE
L-FFP Cheetah Frigate FRIGATE
L-SC Ocelot Scout SPECIAL
L-SC+ Ocelot Scout SPECIAL
L-DW AlleyCat War Destroyer WAR_DESTROYER
L-DW+ AlleyCat War Destroyer WAR_DESTROYER
L-DWP AlleyCat War Destroyer WAR_DESTROYER
L-DWF AlleyCat War Destroyer WAR_DESTROYER
L-DWS War Destroyer Scout SPECIAL
L-DWSP War Destroyer Scout SPECIAL
L-DWSF War Destroyer Scout SPECIAL
L-DWL War Destroyer Leader WAR_DESTROYER
L-DWLP War Destroyer Leader WAR_DESTROYER
L-PFT PF Tender CARRIER
L-PFW War PF Tender CARRIER
L-PFWP War PF Tender CARRIER
NOTE -- the ships marked "SPECIAL" cannot be purchased for your
use.
24.2.2 Destroyers and Light Cruisers
Again, power refits dominated the picture. You need to get close
to use the ESG, and for that, you need speed.
L-DD Leopard Destroyer DESTROYER
L-DD+ Leopard Destroyer DESTROYER
L-DDP Leopard Destroyer DESTROYER
L-DDF Leopard Destroyer DESTROYER
L-DDG Commando Destroyer SPECIAL
L-DDG+ Commando Destroyer SPECIAL
L-CW Jaguar War Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
L-CW+ Jaguar War Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
L-CWP Jaguar War Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
L-CWF Jaguar War Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
L-CWL War Cruiser Leader LIGHT_CRUISER
L-CWLP War Cruiser Leader LIGHT_CRUISER
L-CWLF War Cruiser Leader LIGHT_CRUISER
L-NCA King Jaguar New Heavy Cruiser NEW_HEAVY_CRUISER
L-NCAL New Command Cruiser NEW_HEAVY_CRUISER
L-CWG Commando War Cruiser SPECIAL
L-CWG+ Commando War Cruiser SPECIAL
NOTE -- the ships marked "SPECIAL" cannot be purchased for your
use.
24.2.3 Heavy Cruisers and Battlecruisers
Lyrans are one of the few races that actually pushed their survey
ships into combat duty.
Note that the Wildcat got reclassified as BCH when it received
the refits. That makes it one of the lightest BCH's around.
Beware of its limitations.
The EGO is ALL ESG, no disruptors. Not that useful if you ask me.
L-CL Panther Light Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
L-CL+ Panther Light Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
L-CLP Panther Light Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
L-CLF Panther Light Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
L-CA Tiger Heavy Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
L-CA+ Tiger Heavy Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
L-CAP Tiger Heavy Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
L-CAF Tiger Heavy Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
L-CC Bengal Tiger Command Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
L-CC+ Bengal Tiger Command Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
L-SR Prairie Cat Survey Ship HEAVY_CRUISER
L-SR+ Prairie Cat Survey Ship HEAVY_CRUISER
L-BC Wildcat Battlecruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
L-BCPP Wildcat Battlecruiser HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
L-BCPF Wildcat Battlecruiser HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
L-BCP+ Wildcat Battlecruiser HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
L-BCF+ Wildcat Battlecruiser HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
L-CCH Java Tiger Heavy Command Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
L-EGO ESG Global Operations Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
L-BCH Hellcat Heavy Battlecruiser HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
L-BCHP Hellcat Heavy Battlecruiser HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
L-BCHF Hellcat Heavy Battlecruiser HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
24.2.4 Dreadnoughts
Dreadnoughts aren't that special, just bigger and tougher Lyran
ships.
L-DN Lion Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
L-DNP+ Lion Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
L-DNF+ Lion Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
L-DNPP Lion Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
L-DNPF Lion Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
L-DNH Heavy Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
L-BB Cave Lion Battleship BATTLESHIP
L-BBF Cave Lion Battleship BATTLESHIP
24.3 FIGHTING OTHER RACES
Here's some discussion on fighting special enemies.
24.3.1 Klingon, Romulan
These are normally your allies, so you wouldn't be fighting them.
However, it's nice to know your enemy's weaknesses.
To be completed.
24.3.2 ISC
Consider turning ESG off except when you are able to arrange an
overrun.
To be completed.
24.3.3 Mirak
ESG is a great drone defense tool. When combined with your
phasers and tractors, you should be nearly drone proof.
Definitely go for overruns.
24.3.4 Hydrans
Lyran fighting Hydrans tend to use ESG as fighter defense, which
may not be a good idea. Fighters usually won't approach close
enough. If you set ESG to higher radius, it's less effective.
ESG also interacts with Hellbore, thus giving you an 'extra' set
of shields.
24.3.5 Federation
You probably won't fight the Feds as they're on the other side of
Mirak, but you need to be prepared.
Feds like overrun with photons, so your ESG makes a good match.
If he goes for maneuver, fly like a Klingon and pound him from a
distance.
24.3.6 Orions
Orions can be armed with just about anything.
24.3.7 Monsters
Nothing too special with the Lyrans against monsters. Overrun
when you can.
25 Mirak
Mirak loves drones. Their ships usually have a LOT of drone
launchers and a LOT of reloads. They use disruptors as secondary
weapons.
Mirak ships are decently built though not quite to the level of
the Feds. Maneuvering is slightly better than the Feds. Reliance
on drones means it CAN kill larger prey if it gets lucky with the
drone hits. However, there are plenty of defenses against drones.
Mirak are mortal enemies of the Lyrans.
Mirak have good number of transporters and captures with Mirak is
relatively easy.
25.1 GENERAL MIRAK TACTICS
Mirak, as the primary drone-using race, relies on the "drone
swarm" tactic. They use scatter-packs all the time. They use
anchor when they can.
Mirak, being drone users, can maintain a higher battle speed than
most other races since drones don't use power. However,
maintaining enough drones in their supplies can be difficult. In
long battles against enemies equipped to fight swarms, Mirak can
be depleted.
Mirak ships tend to have front center-line firepower. This means
you need to do either over run or battle pass. However, remember,
drones are 360 degree weapons.
Mirak ships need less power due to the drones, so exploit all
that speed.
Mirak ship has equal turn modes to a Lyran ship, and not quite as
good as a Klingon ship.
Mirak ships have slightly below average shields.
25.2 COMMENTS BY CLASS
Freighters are discussed in their own section, as you'll never
"command" one.
25.2.1 Frigates
Z-POL Police Corvette FRIGATE
Z-FLG Police Flagship FRIGATE
Z-FF Frigate FRIGATE
Z-FF+ Frigate (Refit) FRIGATE
Z-FFK Improved Frigate FRIGATE
Z-FFK+ Improved Frigate (Refit) FRIGATE
Z-DF Drone Frigate FRIGATE
Z-DF+ Drone Frigate (Refit) FRIGATE
Z-FH Heavy Frigate FRIGATE
Z-FH+ Heavy Frigate (Refit) FRIGATE
Z-EFF Escort Frigate FRIGATE
Z-AFF Aegis Escort Frigate FRIGATE
Z-SF Scout Frigate SPECIAL
Z-SF+ Scout Frigate (Refit) SPECIAL
Z-SDF Scout Drone Frigate SPECIAL
Z-SDF+ Scout Drone Frigate (Refit) SPECIAL
Z-FFG Commando Frigate SPECIAL
NOTE -- the ships marked "SPECIAL" cannot be purchased for your
use.
Police ships, as in all races, are extremely weak. The flagship
has more shields at the expense of firepower.
The frigate doesn't have enough direct firepower. Once it is out
of drones it must disengage. The FFKs (sometimes called the
"Killer" variant) added more disruptors for direct-combat power.
There are also plenty of other variants such as Heavy, Escort,
Aegis Escort, Drone, Scout, and so on.
Regular ships have single drone control. Drone ships have double
drone control.
A note on the Scout Drone frigate: it's an odd hybrid of a scout
and a long-range drone bombardment ship. One of the Mirak drones
is like a "long-range cruise missile" (not in SFC though),
capable of reaching across sectors. If a scout can pin point the
location of an enemy convoy, a drone bombardment vessel, loaded
with these "cruise drones", can attack one of these convoys from
a safe distance. However, scouts are hard to build and the more
vessels you send, the more likely they will in intercepted. The
result is this hybrid ship that can do both. That idea turned out
to have problems as the Klingons simply resorted to staking out
likely launch spots.
Mirak frigates have surprising amount of firepower if you exploit
the scatter-pack. However, when fighting races equipped to fight
drones the Mirak are at a disadvantage.
Their firing arcs aren't that great, tend to be one side vs. the
other side.
25.2.2 Destroyers (including War Destroyers)
Z-DD Destroyer DESTROYER
Z-DD+ Destroyer (Refit) DESTROYER
Z-DWS War Destroyer Scout SPECIAL
Z-DWS+ War Destroyer Scout SPECIAL
Z-DW War Destroyer WAR_DESTROYER
Z-DWD War Drone Destroyer WAR_DESTROYER
Z-DWE War Destroyer Escort WAR_DESTROYER
Z-DWG Commando War Destroyer SPECIAL
Z-DWL War Destroyer Leader WAR_DESTROYER
Z-DDV Destroyer Carrier CARRIER
Z-DWV Mobile Carrier CARRIER
NOTE -- the ships marked "SPECIAL" cannot be purchased for your
use.
There are two classes of destroyers in Mirak hierarchy:
destroyer, and war destroyer. A war destroyer is basically a
beefed up frigate so it's almost equivalent to a destroyer.
The DWV is a carrier based on the war destroyer hull. The
squadron is quite small (2+2).
There's nothing too special about these ships. They are typically
Mirak.
25.2.3 Cruisers / Battlecruisers
Z-CL Light Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
Z-CL+ Light Cruiser (Refit) LIGHT_CRUISER
Z-CLG Light Commando Cruiser SPECIAL
Z-MDC Medium Drone Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
Z-MDC+ Medium Drone Cruiser (Refit) LIGHT_CRUISER
Z-CM Medium Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
Z-CM+ Medium Cruiser (Refit) LIGHT_CRUISER
Z-MEC Medium Escort Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
Z-MAC Medium Escort Cruiser (Refit) LIGHT_CRUISER
Z-MCC Medium Command Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
Z-MCG Medium Commando Cruiser SPECIAL
Z-MCV Medium Carrier CARRIER
Z-CVE Escort Carrier CARRIER
Z-CVE+ Escort Carrier (Refit) CARRIER
Z-CA Heavy Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
Z-CS Strike Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
Z-CD Drone Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
Z-CD+ Drone Cruiser (Refit) HEAVY_CRUISER
Z-CC Command Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
Z-CC+ Command Cruiser (Refit) HEAVY_CRUISER
Z-CCH Heavy Command Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
Z-BC Battlecruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
Z-BC+ Battlecruiser (Refit) HEAVY_CRUISER
Z-BCH Heavy Battlecruiser HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
Z-SR Survey Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
Z-CLV Light Carrier CARRIER
Z-CLV+ Light Carrier (Refit) CARRIER
Z-CV Carrier CARRIER
Z-CVS Strike Carrier CARRIER
Z-CVS+ Strike Carrier (Refit) CARRIER
Z-BCV Battle Carrier CARRIER
Z-NCA New Heavy Cruiser NEW_HEAVY_CRUISER
NOTE -- the ships marked "SPECIAL" cannot be purchased for your
use.
Mirak designed a range of "medium cruisers", which are really
light cruisers with lengthened hulls. They don't have a 'war
cruiser' class. Their light and medium cruiser hull is sufficient
for their use.
Mirak was the first to introduce a "battlecruiser", but it is
really just a heavy cruiser with a couple more weapons than
normal. It wasn't until the BCH that the Mirak have a "true"
battlecruiser.
With up to 5 drone launchers, the Mirak cruisers can put out a
true swarm without using a scatter-pack. Some drone variants can
launch 7 drones simultaneously. That is a lot of drones to defend
from. Of course, the reload costs will stagger you, esp. if you
don't earn much from each battle.
Mirak disruptor arcs are not as good as the Klingon's arcs. Make
180 turns to bring the other side's weapons to bear.
The BCV can be quite dangerous as its fighters can double/triple
your drone launch rate. If you got 2 full squadrons of heavy
fighters (total of 8 fighters), they each will shoot off their
own drones (and reloads). Add your own swarm, and there will be
30+ drones at the same time. Not even multiple ESG fields can
protect the Lyrans from that kind of swarm.
25.2.4 Dreadnoughts
Z-DN Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
Z-DN+ Dreadnought (Refit) DREADNOUGHT
Z-DNH Heavy Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
Z-CVA Heavy Carrier CARRIER
Z-BB Battleship BATTLESHIP
The dreadnoughts are just heavier versions of your typical Mirak
ship, with a LOT of drone launchers and more disruptors.
Like the BCV, the CVA can be quite dangerous.
25.3 FIGHTING OTHER RACES
25.3.1 Klingons
Klingons operate ADDs, so to kill Klingons you need REALLY big
swarms, and use the anchor so he can't weasel. Get in close so
his ADDs have no time to shoot.
He can't hurt you with his drones so just reserve a few tractors
for defense.
H&R targets should be ADD, disruptors, tractors, and phasers.
25.3.2 Lyrans
The main problem killing Lyrans is their ESG. If they charge all
ESGs and do an overrun, they can do severe damage to your ship
and drones depending on how many ESGs. The ESGs recharge, and
your drones don't replenish.
Sacrifice a side shield and your first swarm to pop the ESG.
Leave the scatter-pack behind (beyond his weapons reach) just
before the overrun so when his ESG goes down, the missiles from
the scatter pack will catch him. Of course he still has phasers
and tractors, but at least it's more likely to penetrate.
Designate ESG as your primary H&R target, along with tractors and
maybe phasers.
25.3.3 Romulans
Romulans love to cloak. Use regular weapons to "plink" them when
they're under cloak. Launch swarms when they decloak.
Keep phasers in reserve, esp. rear-arc phasers for point-defense.
Designate certain groups of phasers for offense and use those
only for "plinking".
Keep speed up to outrun torpedoes. Keep at least distance of 5-10
between you and the enemy for room to maneuver except when he's
cloaked. THEN do overruns. Don't forget the "flash bulb" tactic.
25.3.4 ISC
ISC are sort of like Romulans, as they like plasma torpedoes.
Their PPD can do you some damage, but nice part about drones is
no firing arc restrictions. You can rotate all around and still
launch drones.
ISC are vulnerable to swarms and will tend to weasel. Just don't
get caught by those torpedoes on a weakened/down shield and you
can beat the ISC.
25.3.5 Orions
Orions can be equipped many ways, so tactics fighting them will
vary.
If they don't cloak, you can anchor and swarm normally. Watch out
for the drone equipped Orions, as they can use scatter-packs.
If they do cloak, treat them like Romulans.
25.3.6 Feds, Hydrans, Gorn
These are nominally Mirak allies and you should not be fighting
them any time soon. In any case, the Gorn is on the other side of
the Federation and you should almost never see them.
The Feds have ADDs and they can use up your drones. Fly like a
Klingon and wear away his shields. Launch really close to him so
he has no time for his ADDs to fire. H&R his drone defenses
(tractors, ADDs, etc.).
The Hydrans... First kill their fighters with drones and phasers.
THEN their ship will be vulnerable to drone swarms. They don't
operate that many Ph-Gs. Stay away from their fusion beams.
Reinforce weakened shield so the hellbore don't break through.
Gorns are slow and cumbersome. Drone swarms work wonders on the
Gorn. Stay away so you don't get anchored.
25.3.7 Monsters
Monsters are very easy to kill with Mirak. Just keep your
distance and keep launching drones. Most monsters can't even
outrun slow drones, much less medium and fast drones. You
probably don't even need a scatter pack.
On the weaker monsters (the small ones), or space shell, you can
close in and use overloaded weapons, thus save the drones for
later.
26 Romulans
Romulans are famous for their cloaking device and plasma
torpedoes.
Romulan ships have three distinct generations: refitted relics,
Klingon conversions, and new designs. Each generation is quite
different in design philosophy and equipment. See the manual for
more details on each generation.
26.1 OLD GEN ROMULAN SHIP TACTICS
The old gen Romulan ships have lousy hull, lousy turn mode, and
lousy power. However, they have good shields, some armor, and
very heavy weapons for their size. And of course, they have the
cloak, and the NSM.
Consider your battles as "samurai duels"... Like those Japanese
samurai epics, ONE volley will determine who win or lose. This
means you HAVE to look for THE shot. Spend your pseudo in the
most opportune moment. One mistake, and you're doomed.
Use the NSM in the underrun to force the enemy to turn a certain
direction to help you disengage.
Older Rom ships do NOT have the power to do the Gorn anchor, so
don't do it.
26.2 KLINGON TRANSFER SHIPS
The KR ships are decent ships... They traded shields and some
weapons for maneuverability and survivability. You can now go for
a bit more maneuver battles. Oblique pass and underrun are now
possibilities.
One possible tactic is the underrun feint. Do your battle turn,
fire pseudos and cloak. The enemy ship fires his weapons and turn
away. You then immediately decloak and feed him the REAL
torpedoes.
26.3 THE NEW GEN ROM SHIPS
The Hawk series are built for the oblique pass, and lots of
maneuvers. Hawk series has good plasma arcs and wide phaser arcs.
Maintain high speed, do the oblique attack, and kill those
enemies.
26.4 COMMENTS BY CLASS
26.4.1 Frigates
Romulan frigates and destroyers have 3 distinct generations. The
Snipe-class is the old gen, the K-series (Klingon conversions)
are the mid-gen, and the SeaHawk/Skyhawk are the late-gen.
The Snipe series is pretty bad. You really want the K's ASAP.
The Skyhawk and Seahawk are modular ships that can be converted
into variants in minimal amount of time provided that the proper
modules are available and yard space is available for the swap.
R-SNP Snipe-P Police Ship FRIGATE
R-SNP+ Snipe-P Police Ship FRIGATE
R-SNA Snipe-A Frigate FRIGATE
R-SNAR Snipe-A Frigate FRIGATE
R-SNB Snipe-B Battle Frigate FRIGATE
R-SEA SeaHawk-A Frigate FRIGATE
R-SEC SeaHawk-C Scout Frigate FRIGATE
R-SEG SeaHawk-G Commando Frigate FRIGATE
R-SEL SeaHawk-L Frigate Leader FRIGATE
R-K4RB Escort FRIGATE
R-K4R Escort FRIGATE
R-K5L Frigate Leader DESTROYER
R-K5S Scout SPECIAL
R-K5R Frigate DESTROYER
R-SKA SkyHawk-A Destroyer DESTROYER
R-SKC SkyHawk-C PF Tender CARRIER
R-SKF SkyHawk-F Scout DESTROYER
R-SKG SkyHawk-G Commando Destroyer DESTROYER
R-SKL SkyHawk-L Destroyer Leader DESTROYER
R-K5RB Frigate DESTROYER
R-K5SB Scout SPECIAL
R-K5LB Frigate Leader DESTROYER
R-KFR Battle Frigate DESTROYER
NOTE -- the ships marked "SPECIAL" cannot be purchased for your
use.
26.4.2 Light Cruisers
Like the destroyers and frigates, you'll find 3 generation of
ships here... Battlehawk and Warbird are the old gen, the KD's
are the converted Klingon D-6's and D-7's, and the new modular
SparrowHawk-series are the new gen.
Note the one oddball here: Warbird. It is TECHNICALLY a cruiser,
but it's really a frigate with a tremendous punch (type-R
plasma). Of course, it can't move much, being a sublight ship.
Battlehawk is actually a pretty good destroyer, being able to
move at a decent speed while cloaked AND charge weapons..
The SparrowHawk is a modular cruiser that can be converted to
different variants by swapping out certain modules. Some modules
contain weapons and power, some contain commando barracks, some
contain hangar modules, and so on. They are better than most war
cruisers.
R-WB+ Warbird Cruiser FRIGATE
R-SPA SparrowHawk-A Light Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
R-SPA+ SparrowHawk-A Light Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
R-SPC SparrowHawk-C Scout Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
R-SPC+ SparrowHawk-C Scout Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
R-SPE SparrowHawk-E PF Tender CARRIER
R-SPG SparrowHawk-G Commando Cruiser SPECIAL
R-SPG+ SparrowHawk-G Commando Cruiser SPECIAL
R-SPJ SparrowHawk-J Assault Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
R-SPL SparrowHawk-L Light Command LIGHT_CRUISER
Cruiser
R-SPL+ SparrowHawk-L Light Command LIGHT_CRUISER
Cruiser
R-SPZ SparrowHawk-Z Acceleration Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
R-CH ChickenHawk PF Tender CARRIER
R-BH BattleHawk Destroyer DESTROYER
R-BHR BattleHawk Destroyer DESTROYER
R-COH Commando Hawk SPECIAL
R-COHR Commando Hawk SPECIAL
R-KDR Cruiser WAR_DESTROYER
R-KDP PF Tender CARRIER
NOTE -- the ships marked "SPECIAL" cannot be purchased for your
use.
26.4.3 Heavy Cruisers and Battlecruisers
Again, the Romulans have 3 generation of ships. The War Eagle is
the Warbird with warp engines, and it made do. The K series are
the Klingon conversions, and there were quite a few of those.
When the Romulans finally got their own cruisers online, they
made great ones.
The Superhawk, Firehawk, Regalhawk, Royalhawk, and Novahawk are
very fine samples of cruisers... They are definitely a match to
any other cruisers in the galaxy. While their original design was
modular, the frame must be hard-welded (i.e. no swapping modules)
to account for possible shock. They have great forward centerline
firepower and a lot of power for other uses.
Romulans see their plas-R as their "ultimate weapon", and they
tried to get as many of them into battle as possible. Killerhawk
was the result. It has more firepower and shields than some
dreadnoughts, not to mention battlecruisers.
R-WE War Eagle Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
R-WER War Eagle Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
R-SE Scout Eagle LIGHT_CRUISER
R-SER Scout Eagle LIGHT_CRUISER
R-CE Commando Eagle SPECIAL
R-KE King Eagle Command Cruiser LIGHT_CRUISER
R-KR Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
R-KRB Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
R-KRC Command Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
R-KRCS Command Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
R-KRE Exploration Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
R-KREB Exploration Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
R-KRG Commando Cruiser SPECIAL
R-KRGB Commando Cruiser SPECIAL
R-KRP PF Tender CARRIER
R-K7R Battlecruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
R-K7RB Battlecruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
R-SUA SuperHawk-A Command Cruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
R-FHA FireHawk-A Heavy Cruiser HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
R-FHK FireHawk-K Heavy Cruiser HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
R-RGK RegalHawk-K Heavy Cruiser HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
R-RHK RoyalHawk-K Command Cruiser NEW_HEAVY_CRUISER
R-NHK NovaHawk-K Command Cruiser HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
R-KCR Heavy Battlecruiser HEAVY_CRUISER
R-KHK KillerHawk Super-Heavy Cruiser HEAVY_BATTLECRUISER
NOTE -- the ships marked "SPECIAL" cannot be purchased for your
use.
26.4.4 Dreadnoughts
Romulan dreadnoughts comes in 2 classes... Klingon-conversion,
and home-grown. The K9's are converted from Klingon C9's, while
Condor is home grown. With the R-torps, these dreadnoughts are
some of the best this galaxy has seen.
The ROC is a REALLY optimized Condor that's pushed to near-heavy
dreadnought class.
Romulans had plans for a B-10 conversion, but no hull was
actually delivered by the Klingons (who were too busy making
their own). Romulans also were never really rich enough to build
their own BB, but they had designed the King Condor.
R-KVL King Vulture Early DN DREADNOUGHT
R-K9R Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
R-K9RB Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
R-K9RH Heavy Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
R-CON Condor Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
R-CON+ Condor Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
R-PRA Praetor Heavy Dreadnought DREADNOUGHT
R-ROC Romulan Optimized Condor DREADNOUGHT
R-K10R Battleship BATTLESHIP
R-KCN King Condor Battleship BATTLESHIP
26.5 FIGHTING OTHER RACES
26.5.1 Federation
Feds will tend to keep away from you as they know your power of
plasma. They will seek to draw your plasma, then come back for an
overrun. Confuse them with pseudos (NOT necessarily the first
shot) and downloading.
26.5.2 Gorn
Battle with the Gorn tends to be long and drawn-out affairs. It's
been called "plasma ballet", except the Gorn can only waddle. Use
your superior turn mode to get away from his torpedoes while
setting up your own.
26.5.3 ISC
Those PPDs can be troublesome. The "weasel decloak" may be useful
to get within the PPD's myopic zone. Otherwise, fight with the
ISC is pretty even except for your cloaking device.
26.5.4 Mirak and Hydrans
You probably won't fight the Mirak or the Hydrans as they're on
the wrong front.
For Mirak, reserve phasers and tractors for point defense, as
their scatter pack can deliver MORE crunch power than your
torpedoes. Their drones are usually slower than your plasmas, but
they don't dissipate. So fire from less than range 10 if
possible.
For Hydrans, deal with the fighters first, if any. Then consider
opening with an enveloping torpedo or two to sandpaper his
shields. Stay away from the fusion beam ships and pound the
hellbore ships.
26.5.5 Orions
Orions can be armed with anything.
26.5.6 Klingons and Lyrans
These are nominally your allies, so you probably won't fight
them. Still, it's nice to know a few tricks.
For Klingons, their low crunch power means they'll stay away.
Download torpedo to get into range. Reserve tractors for drone
defense.
For Lyrans, you'll just have to do your plasma ballet and stay
away from his ESGs. Do NOT cloak. Their ESG don't care if you're
cloaked or not, but plasma goes right through.
26.5.7 Monsters
Romulans and monsters... enveloping torpedoes all the way, except
astro-miners (who are also equipped with plasma) and Sungliders
(who has shields).
27 Orions
As you can't play AS the Orions (the OP expansion will be covered
by a separate guide) this section is mainly as a tactical
briefing.
Orions show up just about EVERYWHERE and can act as mercenaries
to all of the major races. They can also use all sorts of
equipment. Most Orions use a mix of weapons.
Orion ships also have a lot of boarding parties compared to other
ships.
Orions don't operate heavy military ships. The largest military
ship they have is a BCH, and there is only one of them per
cartel, as the main cartel enforcer. Each local "branch" of the
cartel own a CA as the local enforcer.
Orion DN, CVA, and BB are in the master shiplist, and thus is
listed below for comparison. They are listed as "conjectural".
The smaller ships, such as CR, BR, LR, and DBR did the every-day
raiding and mercenary activities.
Trivia: the DoubleRaider was really two light raiders joined
together like a Siamese twin. Some smaller shipyards can't build
the larger hull, so they settle for this. It is tolerable but not
that good.
There are THREE variations to each class of ships, differing
slightly on armament.
Some Orion ships may have a cloaking device.
Orion freighter, the "Slaver" and "Viking", may make an
occasional appearance.
27.1 LIGHT UNITS
DW Outlaw-class War Destroyer
DWS War Destroyer Scout
PR Patrol-class light raider
LR Privateer-class light raider
LR+ Improved LR
LRS Scout LR
27.2 MEDIUM UNITS
DCR Hellraiser-class Double Raider Cruiser
DBR Plunderer-class Double Raider
CR Raider-class cruiser (light)
CR+ Raider-class cruiser (improved)
AR Attack Raider-class light cruiser
MR Medium Raider-class light cruiser
BR Battle Raider-class war cruiser
BRC Battle Raider-class, Commando
BRH Master Assassin-class new heavy cruiser
27.3 HEAVY UNITS
BC Heavy Marauder-class Battlecruiser
BCH Executioner-class Heavy Battlecruiser
BCV Executioner-class Battle Carrier
CA Marauder-class heavy cruiser
CA+ Marauder-class heavy cruiser, plus refit
CV Marauder-class carrier
HR Heavy Raider-class cruiser
27.4 CONJECTURAL SUPER-HEAVY UNITS
DN Grandfather-class DN (conjectural)
CVA Heavy Carrier (conjectural)
BB Battleship (conjectural) [Great-grandfather-class?]
27.5 FREIGHTERS
SLV Slaver-class freighter
VIK Viking-class freighter
28 Monsters
You can't play as a monster. This is mainly here to show you how
the monsters are armed and how you can kill them.
There are 18 different monsters, divided into 6 types (AM, DM,
LC, MT, SG, SS) of 3 sizes (S,M,L) each.
Monsters rarely if ever exceed speed 15, though some can go speed
25 in certain cases. The larger they are, the slower than move.
Average speed is about 12. The small monsters have been seen
moving at speed 28 to 31.
Monsters are unshielded except Sungliders (SG's). They have armor
instead. That means you can hit them from ANY angle. Plasma users
should use enveloping torpedoes, as that causes FAR more damage.
On a shield you end up damaging shields, but on unshielded
targets they do all internal damage.
Monsters are vulnerable to mines in general. They usually have
pretty lousy turn rates.
Monsters are vulnerable to seeking weapons except the SG's. That
one has phasers that can kill drones. However, a big enough salvo
can kill any monster.
In general, monsters are quite easy to kill unless you are
careless. These are the easiest prestige points you can earn.
28.1 ASTRO MINERS
[Looks like an asteroid]
The AM's (Astro-miners) are armed with plasma torpedoes, and are
very dangerous. The bigger ones have heavier torpedoes, including
Type-R torpedoes, as well as an assortment of smaller torpedoes.
Stay at high-speed and stay away from it. Reserve phasers for
torpedo defense. Fight at long range so you have time to wear
down the torpedo. Do NOT close to overload range. Don't even come
with in range 10 of this monster.
Use all seeking weapons you got, scatter-pack is good. Shuttles
may be too slow.
28.2 DOOMSDAY MACHINES (SPECIAL)
Doomsday Machine only appears in special scenarios.
The DM's (Doomsday Machines) are armed with PPDs. Their splash
damage can strip your facing shields. It also has tractor beams,
so drones may not be of much use against this one.
28.3 LIVING CAGES
[Looks like a bunch of rods connected together like a
construction scaffold]
The LC's (Living Cage's) are armed with Hellbores. Their splash
damage goes after your weakest shields. The larger they are, the
more hellbores they have. Otherwise they are not too hard to
kill, esp. with seeking weapons.
LC's (along with MT's) can repair themselves slowly.
28.4 M-EATERS
[Looks like a tripod inverted]
The MT's (M-Eater's) are armed with Fusion Beams, which is a
close range weapon, so stay away. The bigger the MT, the more
FB's it has. It can beat down your facing shield on one pass.
They usually don't move that fast, so you can dodge them.
MT can also repair itself slowly (like Living Cages).
28.5 SUNGLIDERS
[Looks like a spinning top where the top part is a spread of
spikes]
The SG's (Sungliders) are armed with phasers (up to Ph-4's). It
also has shields instead of armor.
Stay at long-range and overwhelm one of its shields, then go in
and blast it into pieces. It can repair itself slowly.
28.6 SPACESHELLS
[Looks like a bullet with a split tail]
The SS's (Spaceshells) are armed with disruptors, and not that
dangerous. They can move pretty fast so they may be able to
outrun slow drones. The bigger the monster, the more/heavier the
disruptors are.
29 Bases
Bases and planets are the places where you get your supplies in
Dynaverse. Occasionally you'll bee to attack (or defend?) one so
it's best to know.
29.1 STARBASE (SB)
Starbase is the big mama, armed with ph-4's that can blow up
ships, as well as heavy weapons. Some have hangars for PF's or
fighters, and shields that are extremely heavy. So how do you
kill one? With a LOT of firepower.
Deal with the defender ships first, away from the base. Those ph-
4's can hit from very far away (range of 100) so stay away for
now. Then kill the PF's or fighters. Arm all the scatter packs
you can and perform oblique pass with ECM and EM. Then start
launching overwhelming salvoes of drones and seeking weapons.
Then start circling the base, reinforce facing shields, and fire
at its down shields. If it hits your (or your ships) hard, turn
180 and let the other shields take the heat for a while. If you
shoot only at the down shield it should not take long to kill the
base.
Some starbases carry PF or Fighter modules for added firepower.
29.2 BATTLESTATION (BATS)
To be completed.
29.3 BASE STATION (BS)
Base Stations are simple structures that is not that heavy armed,
but they have enough phaser-4s to make a big dent in your
shields. Against a fleet they won't last very long, but they can
damage a single ship easily.
Visually, they look like a tripod with a box on top.
29.4 MISC STATIONS
Other than the big three, there are also smaller stations like
science stations, listening stations, relay posts, stardocks, and
so on. Those are usually NOT manned or minimally manned so they
aren't that important.
Science Station (SBS), unarmed, some shields
Defense Platform (DEF), a couple phasers and 2 of the smaller
heavy weapons
Listening Post (LP), unarmed, unshielded
Stardock (FRD) [Fleet Repair Dock], unarmed, shielded, lots of
tractor beams
30 Fighters and Fast Patrol ships
Please see your "ManualAdditions.doc" to see a full list of the
fighters and PFs in the game. This is a summary only.
30.1 FIGHTERS
In general, fighters come in 4 models, light, medium, heavy, and
assault.
The difference between light and medium is minimal. The "light"
trades slightly less "armor" for slightly higher speed. Heavy
fighters are designed for distance combat, and are usually armed
with long-range weapons. Assault fighters are designed for close-
in combat and are equipped with close-in weapons.
As fighters are improved, new classes start to emerge. The new
ones are faster, tougher, deadlier.
There are two types of drone racks on a fighter: a drone I rack
(containing type I drones), and drone IV rack (containing type IV
drones). Type I drones are fast... speed 34.
30.1.1 Federation
Fighter photon is limited to range 4
30.1.1.1 Class 1
Hawk-I: 2 ph3
Jay-I: 2 ph3 (more speed, slightly less armor)
Vulture-I: 2 ph3, 1 photon (1 shot)
Raven-I: 2 ph2, 2 ph3
30.1.1.2 Class 2
Hawk-II: 3 ph3
Jay-II: 2 ph3 (better phaser arcs than J-I)
Vulture-II: 1 drone IV rack (4), 1 photon (2 shots)
Raven-II: 3 ph3, 1 photon (2 shots), 1 ph3 (rear)
30.1.1.3 Class 3
Hawk-III: 1 phG, 1 drone I rack (2)
Jay-III: 1 phG, 1 drone I rack (2)
Vulture-III: 1 phG, 1 ph2, 1 photon (2 shots)
Raven-III: 1 phG, 1 photon (2 shots), 1 drone I rack (4)
30.1.2 Klingons
Fighter disruptor is limited to range 4.
Trivia: the units are named after "Klingon chess" _klin zha_
pieces. For more info, see the novel "The Final Reflection" by
John M. Ford.
30.1.2.1 Class 1
Swift I: 2 ph3
Fencer I: 2 ph3
Blockader I: 2 ph3, 1 drone IV rack (2)
Lancer I: 1 ph2, 2 ph3, 1 disruptor (1 shot)
30.1.2.2 Class 2
Swift II: 3 ph3, 1 drone IV rack (1)
Fencer II: 3 ph3, 1 disruptor (1 shot)
Blockader II: 3 ph3, 1 drone IV rack (2)
Lancer II: 1 ph2, 2 ph3, 1 disruptor (2 shots)
30.1.2.3 Class 3
Swift III: 3 ph3, 1 drone IV rack (2), 1 disruptor (1 shot)
Fencer III: 3 ph3, 1 drone IV rack (2), 1 disruptor (1 shot)
Blockader III: 2 ph3, 1 disruptor (3 shots) 1 drone I rack (2)
Lancer III: 1 ph2, 2 disruptors (4 shot), 1 drone IV rack (2)
30.1.3 Hydrans
Fighter hellbore is limited to range 8 (wow!)
Fighter fusion beam is limited to range 2
30.1.3.1 Class 1
Killer Bee-I: 2 ph3
YellowJacket - I : 2 ph3
Hornet-I: 2 ph3, 1 Hellbore (2 shots)
Wasp-I: 3 ph3, 1 Fusion (1 shot)
30.1.3.2 Class 2
Killer Bee-II: 1 phG
YellowJacket-II: 1 phG, 1 Hellbore (1 shot)
Hornet-II: 2 phG, 1 Hellbore (2 shots)
Wasp-II: 1 ph2, 1 phG, 1 Fusion (2 shots)
30.1.3.3 Class 3
Killer Bee-III: 1 phG, 1 ph3
YellowJacket-III: 1 phG, 1 Hellbore (1 shot), 1 ph3
Hornet-III: 2 phG, 1 Hellbore (2 shots)
Wasp-III: 1 ph2, 2 phG, 2 Fusion (2 shots)
30.1.4 ISC
ISC has no fighter heavy weapons. Instead, they use phasers. They
also feature phGs when their ships don't have them. Interesting,
heh?
30.1.4.1 Class 1
Restitution I: 2 ph3
Writ I: 2 ph3
Tort I: 2 ph3, 1 ph2
Caveat I: 1 ph2, 3 ph3
30.1.4.2 Class 2
Restitution II: 3 ph3, 1 ph2
Writ II: 2 ph3, 1 ph2
Tort II: 3 ph2
Caveat II: 1 ph2, 3 ph3
30.1.4.3 Class 3
Restitution III: 1 phG, 1 ph2
Writ III: 1 phG, 2 ph3
Tort III: 1 phG, 3 ph2
Caveat III: 3 phG, 1 ph2
30.1.5 Mirak
Fighter disruptor is limited to range 4
30.1.5.1 Class 1
Viszla I: 2 ph3
Saluki I: 2 ph3
Mastiff I: 3 ph3, 1 disruptor (2 shots)
Basenji I: 1 ph2, 1 ph3, 2 disruptors (1 shot)
30.1.5.2 Class 2
Viszla II: 3 ph3, 1 drone IV rack (2)
Saluki II: 2 ph3, 1 drone IV rack (2)
Mastiff II: 1 ph3, 1 disruptor (2 shots), 1 drone IV rack (3)
Basenji II: 1 ph2, 2 disruptors (1 shot), 1 drone IV rack (2)
30.1.5.3 Class 3
Viszla III: 3 ph3, 1 drone I rack (3)
Saluki III: 3 ph3, 2 drone I rack (3)
Mastiff III: 2 ph3, 2 drone I rack (4), 1 drone IV rack (2)
Basenji III: 1 ph2, 2 disruptors (4 shots), 1 drone IV rack (2)
30.2 PFS
Only Gorn, Lyran, and Romulan operate PFs in significant numbers.
They come in 5 general classes: INT (interceptor), PF scout, PF,
refitted PF, and PF Leader.
30.2.1 Gorn
The INT is called Pterosaur, and the PF is called Pterodactyl.
INT: 2 pl-F, 2 ph-1
PFS: 2 pl-F, 3 ph-1
PF: 4 pl-F, 3 ph-1
PF+: same as PF but improved shields
PFL: same as PF but improved shields
30.2.2 Lyran
Lyrans call their INT the Lynx, and the PF "Bobcat".
INT: 1 dis1, 2 ph2, 2 ph3
PFS: 1 dis1, 2 ph2, 2 ph3
PF: 2 dis1, 2 ph2, 2 ph3
PF+: same as PF except improved shields
PFE: 4 dis1, 1 ESG, 2 ph2, 2 ph3 (wow, that's a LOT of
firepower!)
30.2.3 Romulan
Romulan PF is named "Centurion". The INT is named (you guessed
it), Decturion.
INT: 2 pl-F, 1 ph1
CENS: 3 pl-F, 1 ph1
CEN: 5 pl-F, 1 ph1
CEN+: same as CEN, improved shields
CENL: same as CEN, improved shields
---THE END---